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THE ORIGIN OF 
 
 METALLIC CURRENCY AND 
 
 WEIGHT STANDARDS. 
 
3LonJ(on : C. J. CLAY and SONS, 
 
 CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY PRESS WAREHOUSE, 
 
 Ave Maria Lane. 
 
 dmnbtiliBe : DEIGHTON, BELL AND CO. 
 
 Eeipjig: F. A. BROCKHAUS. 
 
 j^£fa lotft: MACMILLAN AND CO. 
 
THE ORIGIN OF 
 
 METALLIC CURRENCY AND 
 
 WEIGHT STANDARDS 
 
 WILLIAM RIDGEWAY, M.A., 
 
 PROFESSOR OF GREEK IN QUEEN's COLLEGE, CORK, 
 LATE FELLOW OF GONVILLE AND CAIUS COLLEGE, CAMBRIDGE. 
 
 ANOpconoc H <BoYC h> fc an em MerpoN AnANTcoN. 
 
 CAMBRIDGE : 
 
 AT THE UNIVERSITY PRESS 
 1892 
 
 [j4U Rights reserved.} 
 
 ET 
 
.f' 
 
 /CORNELL 
 . UNIVERSITY 
 LIBRARY 
 
 :^, \ 
 
 A. i+cs'yS" 
 
 CatnbttBge : 
 
 PRINTED BY 0. J. CLAY, M.A. AND SONS, 
 AT THE nNITBESITY PRESS. 
 
PREFACEl 
 
 rriHE following pages are an attempt to arrive at a know- 
 -*- ledge of the origin of Metallic Currency and Weight 
 Standards by the Comparative Method. As both these insti- 
 tutions played a not inconsiderable part in the development 
 of civilization, it seemed worth while to approach the subject 
 from a different point of view from that from which it had been 
 previously studied. Hitherto Numismatists when studying 
 the Origines of Coinage had confined themselves to the mate- 
 rials presented to them in the earliest money of Lydia, Greece 
 and Italy, and on the other hand the Metrologists had almost 
 completely limited their range of observation to the systems 
 of Babylon, Egypt, Greece and Rome. As the Comparative 
 Method has jdelded such excellent results in the study of other 
 human institutions, I have endeavoured by its aid to get some 
 new principles which may throw some fresh light on the first 
 beginnings of monetary and weight systems. 
 
 The leading principle which I have here endeavoured to 
 establish by the Inductive Method, I had already put forward in 
 a short paper, but there are various other doctrines now pub- 
 lished for the first time, such as the origin of the earliest Greek 
 coin types, the origin of the earliest Greek silver coins, of the 
 Greek Obolos, the Sicilian Litra, and Roman As, of the Mina, 
 and its sixty-fold the Talent. 
 
 B, b 
 
VI PREFACE. 
 
 In treating of the Distribution of gold and the priority of 
 its discovery to that of the other metals, I have been led to 
 criticise the principles of the science of Linguistic Palaeonto- 
 logy, which have gained such currency in this country from 
 Schrader's Prehistcyric Antiquities of the Aryans, and from Dr 
 Isaac Taylor's popular little book. The Origin of the Aryans. 
 I have been led to conclude that Comparative Philology taken 
 alone is a misleading guide in the study of Anthropology. 
 
 From the nature of this work, a certain amount of polemic 
 was inevitable ; but I trust that not a line will be found which 
 contains anything which could be offensive to the living, or is 
 disrespectful to great scholars now no more. I owe so much to 
 the works of distinguished men, from whose principles I am 
 obliged to dissent, that I feel myself almost an ingrate who 
 assails his benefactors with the very means provided for him 
 by their labours. 
 
 It now only remains for me to thank many friends, who 
 have aided me and taken an interest in this work. 
 
 To Mr J. G. Frazer, Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge, 
 I am under obligations which I cannot adequately express in 
 words. He has read through the proofs of the whole of this 
 work, and there is scarcely a page which has not benefited from 
 his most careful and acute criticism. Besides this his vast 
 knowledge of the manners and customs of barbarous peoples 
 has furnished me with many most valuable references, and his 
 fine Ethnological Library has been ungrudgingly placed at my 
 disposal. Professor W. Robertson Smith has read the proofs of 
 those pages which deal with Semitic systems, and Prof J. H. 
 Middleton those treating of the Greek. 
 
 By their kind sacrifice of time and labour which have been 
 robbed from important works of their own, the many short- 
 comings of this book have been rendered far less numerous than 
 they otherwise would be, but of course I alone am responsible 
 for the manifold ones which remain. 
 
PREFACE. VU 
 
 I must also express my gratitude to Mr Head, Mr Wroth 
 and Mr Grueber of the Coin Department of the British Museum 
 for their kindness and courtesy in affording me every facility 
 for studying the coins under their charge. 
 
 I have to thank the Syndics of the Cambridge University 
 Press for having undertaken the publication of this work. 
 
 Queen's College, Cork, 
 Christmas Eve, 1891. 
 
X CONTENTS. 
 
 PART II. 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 The Systems of Egypt, Babylon, and Palestine . . . . 234 
 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 The Lydian and Persian Systems 293 
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 The Greek, Sicilian, Italian and Roman Systems. Conclusion . . 304 
 
 Appendix A 389 
 
 Appendix B 391 
 
 Appendix C 394 
 
 Index 407 
 
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. 
 
 Fia 
 
 
 
 PAGE 
 
 1. 
 
 Cowrie Shell . . 
 
 13 
 
 2. 
 
 Wampum .... . . . . 
 
 14 
 
 3. 
 
 Al-li-ko-cliik ... 
 
 15 
 
 4. 
 
 Bunnese silver shell money . .... 
 
 22 
 
 5. 
 
 Chinese hoe money 
 
 23 
 
 6. 
 
 Fish-hook money 
 
 28 
 
 7. 
 
 Siamese silver bullet money . . ... 
 
 29 
 
 8. 
 
 Silvered brass bars 
 
 30 
 
 9. 
 
 Eings found in the tombs of Mycenae .... 
 
 37 
 
 10. 
 
 Gold rings found in Ireland 
 
 38 
 
 11. 
 
 West African axe money 
 
 40 
 
 12. 
 
 Old Calabar copper-wire formerly used as money 
 
 41 
 
 13. 
 
 Irish bronze fibulae and West African manillas 
 
 42 
 
 14. 
 
 Ancient British Coins 
 
 93 
 
 15. 
 
 Barbarous imitation of Drachm of Massaha 
 
 111 
 
 16. 
 
 Gold Stater of Philip of Macedon . ... 
 
 125 
 
 17. 
 
 Persian Daric 
 
 126 
 
 18. 
 
 Gold Stater of Diodotus of Bactria 
 
 126 
 
 19. 
 
 Egyptian wall painting showing the weighing of gold rings 
 
 128 
 
 20. 
 
 Eegenbogenschiissel .... 
 
 140 
 
 21. 
 
 Chinese knife money . . 
 
 157 
 
 22. 
 
 Egyptian Five-Kat weight ... ... 
 
 240 
 
 23. 
 
 Lion weight 
 
 
 245 
 
 24. 
 
 Assyrian Duck weight 
 
 
 245 
 
 25. 
 
 Weights in the form of Sheep 
 
 
 271 
 
 26. 
 
 Coin of Salamis in Cyprus . 
 
 
 272 
 
 27. 
 
 Bull's-head Five-shekel Weight 
 
 
 283 
 
 28. 
 
 Lydian Electrum Coin 
 
 
 295 
 
 29. 
 
 Coin of Croesus . 
 
 
 298 
 
 30. 
 
 Coin of Eretria . 
 
 
 306 
 
 31. 
 
 Coin of Cyrene with Silphium plant . 
 
 313 
 
 32. 
 
 Coin of Cyzicus with tunny fish ... 
 
 316 
 
 33. 
 
 Coins of Olbia in the form of tui 
 
 my fish .... 
 
 317 
 
XII LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. 
 
 PIG. PAGE 
 
 34. Coin of Tenedos with double-headed axe 318 
 
 35. Coin of Phanes, earUest known inscribed coin .... 320 
 
 36. Archaic Coin of Samos 321 
 
 37. CoinofCnidus 321 
 
 38. CoinofThurii 322 
 
 39. Coin of Rhoda in Spain 322 
 
 40. Tetradrachm of Athens 325 
 
 41. Vase from Cyrene, showing the weighing of the Silphium . . 326 
 
 42. Coin of Metapontum 327 
 
 43. CoinofCroton 328 
 
 44. Tortoise of Aegina 328 
 
 45. Coin of Boeotia with Shield 331 
 
 46. Coin of Lycia 332 
 
 47. Coin of Messana 336 
 
 48. Aes Rude 355 
 
 49. Bronze Decussis, with figure of Cow 356 
 
 50. As {Aes grave) 361 
 
 51. As (semi-uncial) 362 
 
 52. As, 3rd Cent. a.d. {Third Brass) . .... 362 
 
 53. Didrachm of Corinth ... 362 
 
 54. Sesterce of First Roman Silver coinage . . . . 363 
 
 55. Didrachm of Tarentum . 364 
 
 56. Romano-Campanian coin 377 
 
 57. Victoriatus 377 
 
 58. Sextans {aes grave) 379 
 
 59. Gold Solidus of Julian the Apostate . .... 384 
 
 60. Tremissis of Leo 1 385 
 
CHAPTER I. 
 The Ox and the Talent in Homer. 
 
 'Hmoc a' ofr' dip nco hcoc, Iti a' am(|)iAykh nyI. 
 
 The object of this essay is to enquire into the origin of 
 Metallic Currency and Weight Standards. Since August Boeckh 
 in his metrological enquiries' put forth the idea that the weight 
 standards of antiquity had been obtained scientifically, all 
 subsequent writers with scarcely an exception have followed 
 in the same path. This theory was undoubtedly suggested by 
 the fact that the French Republic had established a new 
 scientific metric system. Yet reflection might have shown 
 scholars that even the French system was not a wholly inde- 
 pendent outcome of science, for beyond doubt the metre and 
 litre and hectare were only varieties of older measures of length, 
 capacity and surface, then for the first time scientifically 
 adjusted. The discovery of certain weights of bronze and 
 stone in the ruins of Nineveh, Khorsabad and Babylon lent force 
 to the theory of Boeckh; the imaginations of scholars were 
 excited by the marvellous remains of Chaldaean and Assyrian 
 civilization which had just been brought to light by Sir A. H. 
 Layard, and they hastened to conclude that in the mathe- 
 matical science of Mesopotamia the source of all weight- 
 standards was to be found. Egypt however put in her claim 
 to priority, and standards based on the measurements of the 
 Great Pyramid, or on the weight of a given quantity of Nile- 
 water, have entered the lists against the astrologers of Chaldaea. 
 This battle still rages hotly, Assyriologists and Egyptologists 
 
 1 Metrologische Untersiichungen iiber Gewichte, Miinzflisse und Masse des 
 AlUrthums in ihrem Zusammenhange. Berlin, 1838. 
 
 B. 1 
 
2 THE OX AND THE TALENT IN HOMEE. 
 
 hurling at each other statements drawn from tablets and 
 papyri, as regards the translation of which no two of these 
 savants are agreed. In spite of this all modern works on 
 metrology start with the systems of Babylon and Egypt and 
 from these they derive the systems of Greece and Italy. It 
 would at least be more scientific to move backwards from the 
 known to the unknown, but beguiled by the glamour of a 
 "scientific" metrological system, scholars have turned their backs 
 upon scientific method. Whilst our knowledge of the Assyrian 
 and Egyptian weight systems is most imperfect, being derived 
 from literary monuments, or from inscriptions on weights not 
 half understood, the systems of Greece and Rome are known to 
 us not simply from the vast literatures written in languages 
 thoroughly intelligible, but likewise from the evidence of 
 immense numbers of coins struck in gold and silver, by the 
 weights of which we are enabled to check off and substantiate 
 the literary sources. 
 
 As Greece coined money several centuries before Italy, and 
 as its literature reaches much further back than that of Rome, 
 it is plain that any sound enquiry into the origin of weight 
 standards must commence with Greece. We shall therefore 
 without further preface proceed to investigate the evidence 
 afforded to us by the oldest Greek records. 
 
 The Homeric Talent. 
 
 In the Homeric Poems, which cannot be dated later than 
 the eighth century B.C., there is as yet no trace of coined money. 
 We find nevertheless in those Poems two units of value; the 
 one is the cow (or ox), or the value of a cow, the other is 
 the Talent (rdXavrov). The former is the one which has 
 prevailed, and does still prevail, in barbaric communities, such 
 as the Zulus of South Africa, where the sole or principal wealth 
 consists in herds and flocks. For several reasons we may 
 assign to it priority in age as compared with the Talent. 
 In the first place it represents the most primitive form of 
 exchange, the barter of one article of value for another, before 
 the employment of the precious metals as a medium of cur- 
 
THE OX AND THE TALENT IN HOMER. 3 
 
 rency; consequently the estimation of values by the cow is older 
 than that by means of a Talent or "weight" of gold, or silver 
 or copper. Again, in Homer, all values are expressed in so 
 many oxen, as "golden arms for brazen, those worth one 
 hundred beeves, for those worth nine beeves'" {II. vi. 236). 
 
 The Talent on the other hand is only mentioned in Homer 
 in relation to gold' (for we never find any mention of a Talent 
 of silver) and we never find the value of any other article ex- 
 pressed in Talents. But the names of monetary units hold their 
 ground long after they themselves have ceased to be in actual 
 use as we observe in such common expressions as "bet a guinea," 
 or worth a "groat," although these coins themselves are no longer 
 in circulation, and so the French sou has survived for a century 
 in popular parlance, and the Thaler has lived into the new 
 German monetary system. Accordingly we may infer that the 
 method of expressing the value of commodities in kine, which 
 we find side by side with the Talent, is the elder of the twain. 
 
 Was there any immediate connection between the two sys- 
 tems or were they as Hultsch (Metrologie^, p. 165) maintains 
 entirely independent? It is difficult to conceive any people, 
 however primitive, employing two standards at the same time 
 which are completely independent of each other. For instance 
 when we find in the Iliad' that in a list of three prizes appointed 
 for the foot-race, the second is a cow, the third is a half-talent of 
 gold, it is impossible to believe that Achilles or rather the poet 
 had not some clear idea concerning the relative value of an ox 
 and a talent. Now it is noteworthy that, as already remarked, 
 nowhere in the Poems is the value of any commodity expressed 
 in Talents; yet who can doubt that Talents of gold passed 
 freely as media of exchange? A simple solution of this 
 difficulty 'would be that the Talent of gold represented the 
 older ox-unit. This would account for the fact that all values 
 are expressed in oxen, and not in Talents, the older name pre- 
 vailing in a fashion resembling the usage oi pecunia in Latin. 
 
 A complete parallel for such a practice can be still found 
 at the present moment among some of the Samoyede tribes 
 
 ^ Xpiffco. xaXKefwc, eKaro^^oC ^vv^a^oitav, 
 - Iliad, XXIII. 750. 
 
 1—2 
 
4 THE OX AND THE TALENT IN HOMER. 
 
 of Siberia. Thus we read in the account of a recent traveller : 
 " He finally came to the conclusion that for the consideration 
 of five hundred reindeer, he would undertake the contract. 
 This I regarded as a very facetious sally on his part. The 
 reindeer however I found was the recognised unit of value, 
 as amongst some tribes of the Ostiaks the Siberian squirrel. 
 For this purpose the reindeer is generally* considered to be 
 worth five roubles^" Again forty years ago Haxthausen^ tells 
 us that the Ossetes, a Caucasian tribe dwelling not very far 
 from Tiflis, although long accustomed to stamped money, 
 especially on the border of Georgia, kept their accounts in cows, 
 five roubles being reckoned to the cow. Here then in Siberia 
 and in the Caucasus, in spite of a long experience not merely 
 of a metallic unit, but of actual coined money, we still find 
 values estimated in reindeer, and in cows, the older units, just 
 as in Homer they are stated in oxen. 
 
 We shall likewise find that when the ancient Irish borrowed 
 a ready made silver unit (the undo) from the Romans, they 
 had to equate this unit to their old barter-unit the cow, just as 
 v^n modern times the wild tribes of Annam when borrowing the 
 bar of silver from their more civilized neighbours have had to 
 equate it to their native standard, the buffalo ; facts in close 
 accord with the well known derivation of Latin pecunia, money 
 from peous, English fee from feoh, which still meant cattle, as 
 does the German Vieh, and rupee (according to some) from 
 Sanskrit rupa, also meaning cattle. 
 
 Let us now see if we have any data to support this hy- 
 pothesis. That most trustworthy writer, Julius Pollux, says 
 in his Onomasticon (ix. 60): "Now in old times the Athenians 
 had this {i.e. the didrachm) as a coin and it was called an 
 ox, because it had an ox stamped on it, but they think that 
 Homer also was acquainted with it when he spoke of (arms) 
 'worth an hundred kine for those worth nine'.' Moreover in 
 
 1 Victor A. L. Morier, Murray's Magazine, August, 1889, p. 181. 
 
 2 Tram-Caucasia, p. 410 (Engl, trans. 1854). 
 
 " Pollux, IX. 73, rb iraXaibv bk tout' ^x 'A8r)vaioi.i vi/utr/ia Kal iKoXeiTO Sous 
 6'n ^ouv etx^'' ivreTviria^vov. elShai 5' a.i>ro Kal "O^rjpov vojil^ovtjw dirbpra e/ca- 
 rbix^oC ivvea^olwv. 
 
THE OX AND THE TALENT IN HOMER. 5 
 
 the laws of Draco there is the expression, to pay back the 
 price of twenty kine : and at the time when the Delians 
 hold their sacred festival, they say that the herald makes 
 proclamation whenever a gift is given by any one, that so 
 many oxen will be given by him, and that for each ox two 
 Attic drachms are offered : whence some are of opinion that 
 the ox is a coin peculiar to the Delians, but not to the 
 Athenians; and that from this likewise has been started the 
 proverb, an ox stands on his tongue, in case any man holds 
 his tongue for money \" 
 
 According to Pollux then the Attic didrachm, or at least 
 a coin employed by the Athenians (perhaps certain coins of 
 Euboea), was called an 'ox.' Plutarch (Theseus, c. 25) goes 
 further and asserts that Theseus struck money stamped with 
 the figure of an ox (eKo^Jre Se vofjuiafMa ^ovv eyx^apd^w;), and 
 the Scholiast on the Birds of Aristophanes (1106) quotes 
 from Philochorus, an Athenian antiquary of the third century 
 B.C.'', the same account of the Attic didrachms being marked 
 with an ox. 
 
 On the other hand the highest authorities on numismatics 
 assert that the Athenians never struck any such coins. Yet 
 after making due allowance for the additions made by Plu- 
 tarch to the more crude statement of Pollux and Philochorus, 
 it is hard to conceive that such a belief could have arisen with- 
 out some foundation, and a probable solution may be found in 
 the fact that certain uninscribed coins, bearing the type of an 
 ox-head, which in recent years have been assigned to Euboea, 
 are for the most part found in Attica. We know that Eretria, 
 and Chalcis, the great cities of Euboea, were amongst the 
 earliest places in Greece to strike money, and it is quite pos- 
 sible, nay probable, that these Euboic coins formed (along with 
 the Aeginetan didrachms) the currency in use at Athens before 
 
 1 Cf. Aeseh. Agam. 36 ; Theognis 815. Cp. rav Aper&v Kal ran ffoiptav vikcLvti 
 XeXuKoi, a proverb (given by Pollux ix. 74) alluding to the Tortoise coins of 
 Aegina; and Menander (Al, 1), iraxis yap 5s heir' iirl <rT6)j,a. 
 
 ^ Tj ykav^ inl xa/jii7/«ciTos 17 TerpaSpixiwv, tlis ^iklixopor IkMiBt] Se to vbiuaiia. 
 rb TeTpddpaxfiov rare \7J] 7Xau^* ^y ycip ij 7\aO| iirio'Tifioi' Kal irpoaiorov 'AdtjirdSf 
 rljiv Tpor^pdJi/ didpdx/J'OJy ovrunt, iiriffTjfiov 5^ ^ovv ^x^^"^^^' 
 
6 THE OX AND THE TALENT IN HOMER. 
 
 the time of Solon (b.c. 596). Why the name ox was especially 
 recollected in after years as that of the earliest currency, we 
 can readily understand; the name derived from the old unit 
 of barter would at once attach itself to the coin which bore 
 the image of the ox, and in the course of time two traditions, 
 one that the ancient unit was the ox, the other that the first 
 coins current at Athens bore the symbol of an ox, would 
 merge into one, and finally patriotic feeling would ascribe the 
 first coinage to Theseus, who was regarded as the father of 
 so many Athenian institutions. 
 
 That, at all events, the name might be applied to a certain 
 sum, or coin, is rendered highly probable by the fact that 
 Draco, with true legal conservatism, retained in his code the 
 primitive method of expressing values in oxen. Now it is 
 evident that the term, 'price of twenty oxen' (elKocrd^oiov), 
 must have been capable of being translated into the ordinary 
 metallic currency, whether that consisted of bullion in ingots 
 or coined money. The "cow" therefore must have had a 
 recognized traditional and conventional value as a monetary 
 unit, and this is completely demonstrated by the practice at 
 Delos. Religious ritual is even more conservative than legal 
 formula, so we need not be surprised to find the ancient 
 unit, the ox, still retained in that great centre of Hellenic 
 worship. The value likewise is expressed in the more modern 
 currency. But we are not yet certain whether the two Attic 
 drachms, which are the equivalent of the ox, are silver or gold. 
 Now Herodotus (vi. 97) tells us that Datis, the Persian general 
 (B.C. 490), offered at Delos three hundred talents of frankin- 
 cense. Hultsch (Metrol. p. 129) has made it clear that the 
 talent here indicated must be the gold Daric, that is the light 
 Babylonian shekel. For if they were either Babylonian or 
 Attic talents, the amount would be incredible. Frankincense 
 was of enormous value in antiquity; wherefore Hultsch is 
 probably right in assuming that in the opinion of the Persian 
 who made the offering, the three hundred "weights" of 
 frankincense, each of which weighed a Daric, were equal in 
 value likewise to 300 Darics. We shall see in a moment that 
 there was a distinct tradition that the Daric was a Talent, and 
 
THE OX AND THE TALENT IN HOMER. 7 
 
 that the Homeric one. Now the. gold Daric = two Attic gold 
 drachms ; but as the cow at Delos also = two Attic drachms, 
 and the offering of frankincense at Delos is made in Talent, 
 each of which is equivalent to two gold Attic drachms, there 
 is a strong presumption that this Talent is the equivalent of 
 the ox, and that the Attic drachms mentioned by Pollux 
 are gold. Besides, it is absurd to suppose that at any time 
 two silver drachms could have represented the value of an 
 ox. Even at Athens, in a time of extreme scarcity of coin, 
 Solon, when commuting penalties in cattle for money in 
 reference to certain ancient ordinances, put the value of the 
 ox at five silver drachms \- Moreover it is not at all likely 
 that the substitiition of silver coin, for gold of equal weight 
 would have been permitted by the temple authorities. But 
 we get some more positive evidence of great interest from 
 the fragment of an anonymous Alexandrine writer on Metro- 
 logy, who says", "the talent in Homer was equal in amount 
 to the later Daric. Accordingly the gold talent weighs two 
 Attic drachms.'' Here we can have no doubt that Attic 
 drachms mean gold drachms. Are we wrong then in supposing 
 that at Delos still survived the same dual system which we 
 found in Homer, the Ox and the Talent ?" But that at Delos 
 both were of equal value we can have little doubt. For the 
 ox = 2 Attic drachms = 1 Daric = 1 Talent = (130 grains 
 Troy). Who can doubt that at Delos was preserved an un- 
 broken tradition from the earliest days of Hellenic settlements 
 in the Aegean ? Modern discovery comes likewise to our 
 support, and we shall find that it is probable that the gold rings 
 found by Dr Schliemann in the tombs at Mycenae were made 
 on a standard of about 135 grs. 
 
 This identification of the ox and the Homeric Talent is of 
 importance : for it gives a simple and natural origin for the 
 earliest Greek metallic unit of which we read. It likewise 
 incidentally explains the proverb, ^ov<; eirl yXwa-a-r) which dates 
 
 ' Plutarch, Solon, c. 15. 
 
 '' Hultsoh, Reliquiae Scriptorum Metrologicorum, i. 301, t6 Si Tap' 'Oixriptf 
 rdXacToc taov eSivaro tQ /ierci. raOra AapecK^. ciyei. S' ovv rb xpvaovv T&'KavTov 
 'Attikos dpaxiias ^' , ypiii,iw.Ta f ', Tcrdpras drfKaSij Tea-<rApas. 
 
8 THE ox AND THE TALENT IN HOMER. 
 
 from a time long before money was yet coined, or even the 
 precious metals were in any form whatever employed for 
 currency ; it possibly explains why the ox was such a favourite 
 type on coins, without having to call to our aid recondite 
 mythological allusions; and it clears up once for all some 
 interesting points in Homer. In the passage of the Iliad 
 (xxill. 750 sq.) already referred to the ox is second prize, whilst 
 an half-talent of gold is the third. The relation between them 
 is now plain ; the ox = 1 talent, and the half-talent = a half-ox. 
 The vexed question of the Trial Scene' can now be put 
 beyond doubt. In the Journal of Philology (Vol. x. p. 30) the 
 present writer argued that the two talents represented a sum 
 too small to form the blood-price {iroivr]) of a murdered man, 
 and consequently must represent the sacramentum (or payment 
 made to the Court for its time and trouble, as in the Roman 
 Legis actio sacramenti described by Gains, Bk. iv. 16), as pro- 
 posed by that most distinguished scholar and jurist, the late 
 Sir H. S. Maine^. We know that the two talents are equal 
 to two oxen, but in the Iliad, XXIII. 705, the second prize for 
 the wrestlers was a slave woman " whom they valued at four 
 oxen'." Now if an ordinary female slave was worth four oxen 
 (= four talents) it is impossible that two talents (= two oxen) 
 could have formed the bloodgelt or eric of a freeman. Pro- 
 bably four oxen was not far from the price of an ordinary 
 female slave. Of course women of superior personal charms 
 would fetch more, for instance, Euryclea, 
 
 "Whom once on a time Laertes had bought with his possessions, 
 When she was still in youthful prime, and he gave the price of 
 twenty kine*." ^ 
 
 The poet evidently refers to this as an exceptional piece 
 of extravagance on the part of Laertes. We can likewise now 
 1 Iliad, xvm. 507, 8, 
 
 Ty Sofiev, 8s /xerct rottrt dUriP idivTara etwa. 
 See Appendix A for a linguistic proof that the two talents were for the Judge. 
 " Ancient Law, p. 375. 
 3 &.v5pi 5^ viKTiBivTi •yvvaiK' h fiiffuov ^dTjKev, 
 
 TToXXa 5' ^iriffTaTo ^pya, tIov 5^ i Teaffapa^oiop. 
 * Od. I. 430. 
 
THE OX AND THE TALENT IN HOMEE. 9 
 
 get a common measure for the ten talents of gold and the 
 seven slave women who formed part of the requital gifts prof- 
 fered by Agamemnon to Achilles', and can form some- notion 
 of the comparative value of the prizes for the chariot race and 
 other contests'. 
 
 The wider question of Weight-standards in general. 
 
 But results far more important than merely the determi- 
 nation of the value of Homeric commodities may be obtained 
 as regards the weight-standards of Europe and their congeners 
 in Asia. For by taking as our primitive unit the cow or ox, 
 we may be able to give a much more simple account of the 
 genesis of those standards than that which hitherto has been 
 the received one. 
 
 We have .found the Homeric ox and talent identical 
 with the didractonor statef . oTTihe Euboic- Attic standard. 
 All the silver coinage of Greece proper was struck either 
 on this standard or the Aeginetic, and what is still more 
 important for us it was on the Euboic-Attic standard alone 
 that gold was estimated in every part of Greece. Practically 
 the stater of this system was of the same weight as the famous 
 Persian daric which in historical times formed the chief coin- 
 unit of all Asia from India to the Aegean shores- 
 
 ' Iliad, IX. 12 seqq. 
 " II. XXIII. 262 seqq. 
 
CHAPTER II. 
 
 Primitive Systems of Cubrency. 
 
 'Ez ANAfKHC H TOY NOMl'cMATOC enOpl'cQH )(pHCIC. 
 
 Abistotle. 
 
 Let us here propound the doctrine which seeks to obtain 
 an explanation of the origin for weight-standards more in 
 accordance with the facts of history and the process of deve- 
 lopment as exemplified both in ancient and modern times. 
 
 In early communities^ all commodities alike are exchanged 
 by bartering the one against the other. The man who pos- 
 sesses sheep exchanges them for oxen with the man who 
 possesses oxen, the owner of corn exchanges his commodity 
 for some implement or ornament of metal with the owner pf 
 the latter. The metals are only regarded as merchandise, not 
 yet being in any degree set apart to serve as a- medium of 
 exchange in the terms of which all other commodities are 
 valued. This is the practice which prevails in so civilized a 
 country as China down to our own days. The only coinage 
 which the Chinese possess is copper cash. According to M. 
 le Comte Rochechouart {Journal des jSccmomistes, Vol. xv. p. 
 103) both gold and silver are treated simply as merchandise, 
 and there is not even a recognized stamp or government 
 guarantee of the fineness of the metal. The traveller must 
 caiTy these metals with him, as a sufficient quantity of strings 
 
 1 Of course amongst the lowest races of savages such as the aborigines 
 of Australia, even barter is almost unknown. Each man makes his own stone 
 implements from the greenstone which is everywhere in abundance, his 
 own clubs and boomerangs, whilst Nature supplies all his other wants. 
 
PRIMITIVE SYSTEMS OF CUHRENCY. 11 
 
 of cash would require a waggon for their conveyance. Yet in 
 exchanging silver or gold he is sure to suffer loss both from 
 the falsity of balances and of weights and the uncertain fine- 
 ness of the metal. 
 
 When in a certain community one particular kind of com- 
 modity is of general use and generally available, this comes to 
 form the unit in terms of which all values are expressed. The 
 nature of this barter-unit will depend upon the nature of the 
 climate and geographical position, and likewise upon the stage 
 of culture to which the people have attained. In the hunting 
 stage, all the property of each individual consists in his wea- 
 pons and implements of war and the chase, and the skins of wild 
 beasts which form his clothing, and sometimes the cover of his 
 hut or wigwam. At a later stage, when he has succeeded in 
 taming the ox, the sheep, or the goat, or the horse, he is 
 the owner of property in domestic animals, whose flesh and 
 milk sustain him and his family, and whose skins and wool 
 provide his clothing. 
 
 By this time too he has found out that it is better to 
 make the captive whom he has taken in war into a hewer 
 of wood and drawer of water than merely to obtain some 
 transient pleasure from eating him after putting him to death 
 by torture, or by wearing his skull or scalp as personal deco- 
 rations. 
 
 This is now the pastoral or nomad stage. 
 
 Next comes the more settled form of life, when the culti- 
 vation of land and the production of the various kinds of 
 cereals renders a permanent dwelling-place more or less neces- 
 sary. 
 
 Property now consists not merely in slaves and domestic 
 animals, but likewise in houses of improved construction, and 
 large stores of grain. Man now possesses certain of the metals, 
 gold and copper being the first to be known. How does 
 he appraise these metals when he exchanges them with his 
 neighbour ? We shall find that he estimates them in terms 
 of cattle, and that he at first barters them all by measures 
 based on the parts of the human body, a method which con- 
 tinues to be employed for copper and iron long after the art of 
 
12 PRIMITIVE SYSTEMS OP CURKENCY. 
 
 weighing has been invented; next he estimates his gold by 
 certain natural units of capacity such as a goosequill, and 
 finally fixes the amount of gold which is equivalent to a cow, 
 by setting it in a rude balance against a certain number of 
 natural seeds of plants. Such is the process which history 
 tells us has taken place in the temperate regions of Asia 
 and Europe, Africa and America. Just as it is impossible 
 to learn the history of the growth of the earth's crust by con- 
 fining our observations to one locality, and as the geologist 
 only succeeds in gaining a true insight into the relations 
 between the various strata by a study of the phenomena of 
 ■ many regions, so we shall only be able to comprehend properly 
 the various stages in the growth of metallic currency and the 
 origin of weight-standards by observing the facts revealed to 
 us in various countries. Whilst in some places we shall meet 
 with but one or two steps, in others we shall find traces of 
 many, though often, broken strata. Like advance, however, 
 seems impossible under the extremes of heat and cold. Hence 
 in the latter regions the conditions of life remain almost un- 
 altered. In the extreme north the rigour of an arctic winter 
 forbids the keeping and rearing of domestic animals, or the 
 cultivation of corn and vegetables. Hence the hunter form 
 of existence remains almost unaltered. The sole or chief 
 wealth of the people consists of the skins of the fur-bearing 
 animals such as the seal, the beaver, the marten, or the fox, 
 or stores of dried fish, which they exchange with traders for 
 a few scant luxuries, or which form their own sustenance and 
 protection against the pitiless frosts and snows. 
 
 In these regions therefore we find the skins of certain 
 animals serving as units of account, in spite of the difference in 
 value between those of different quality and rarity. In the 
 Territory of the Hudson's Bay Company, even after the use 
 of coined money had been introduced among the Indians, the 
 skin was still in common use as the money of account. A 
 gun nominally worth forty shillings brought twenty ' skins.' 
 This term is the old one used by the Company. One skin 
 (beaver) is supposed to be worth two shillings, and it represents 
 two martens and so on. " You heard a great deal about skins 
 
PRIMITIVE SYSTEMS OF CURRENCY. 13 
 
 at Fort Yukon, as the workmen were also charged for clothing, 
 etc., in this way'." Similarly in the extreme north of Asia we 
 find some Ostiak tribes using the skin of the Siberian squirrel 
 as their unit of account. 
 
 The name of a small coin equal to a quarter kopeck indi- 
 cates that originally the Slavs had a like form of currency. It 
 is called polooshka. Ooshka (properly little ears) means a 
 hare-skin, and polooshka means half a hare-skin\ 
 
 When we turn to the torrid zone, where clothes are only 
 an incumbrance and Nature lavishly supplies plenteous stores 
 of fruits and vegetables, the chief objects of desire will not 
 be food and clothing but ornaments, implements and weapons. 
 Hence we find amongst the inhabitants of such regions in 
 especial strength that passion for personal adornment, which 
 is one of the most powerful and primitive instincts of the 
 human race. Shells have from very remote times formed 
 one of the most simple forms of adornment in all parts of 
 the world. Shells which once perhaps formed the necklace 
 of some beauty of the neolithic age are found with the 
 remains of the cave men of Auvergne. Strings of cowries 
 under their various names of changos, zimhis, honges or porcelain 
 
 Fig. 1. Cowrie Shell (Cypraea moneta). 
 
 shells are both durable, universally esteemed, and portable, 
 and therefore suited to form a medium of exchange, and as 
 such they are employed in the East Indies, Siam, and on 
 the East and West Coasts of Africa; on the tropical coasts 
 they serve the purposes of small change, being collected on 
 the shores of the Maldive and Laccadive islands and exported 
 for that object. The relative value varies slightly according 
 to their abundance or scarcity. In India the usual ratio 
 w;as about 5000 to the rupee. Marco Polo found the cowry 
 
 1 Whymper'a Alaska, p. 225. 
 
 2 Morier, Murray's Magazine, August, 1889, p. 181. 
 
 y 
 
14 
 
 PRIMITIVE SYSTEMS OP CUREENCY. 
 
 in use in the province of Yunnam. He says (ii. p. 62, Yule's 
 Transl.) : " In Carajan gold is so abundant that they give one 
 Saggio of gold for six of the same weight of silver. And 
 for small change they use the porcelain shell. These are 
 not found in the country but are brought from India." How 
 ancient is their use in Asia is shown by the fact that Layard 
 found cowries in the ruins of Nineveh. 
 
 Beyond all doubt the wampum belts of the North American 
 Indians served the purpose of currency. They consisted of 
 black and white shells rubbed down, polished and made into 
 beads, and then strung into belts or necklaces, which were 
 
 Fig. 2. Wampum (made from the Venus mercenaria). 
 
 valued according to their length, colour and lustre, the black 
 beads being the most valuable. Thus one foot of black peag 
 was worth two feet of white peag. It was so well estab- 
 lished as a currency among the natives that in 1649 the Court 
 of Massachusetts ordered that it should be received as legal 
 tender among the settlers in the payment of debts up to forty 
 shillings'. 
 
 I Jevons, Money, p. 24, 
 
PRIMITIVE SYSTEMS OF CURRENCY. 
 
 15 
 
 Nor has this employment of strings of shells as money 
 even yet disappeared from North America. Thus Powers 
 writes' of the Karoks and other tribes of California: "For 
 money they make use of the red scalps of woodpeckers, which 
 rate at $2.50 to $5.0 a piece, and of the dentalium shell, of 
 which they grind off the tip, and string it on strings, the 
 shortest pieces are worth 25 cents, and the longest about two 
 dollars, the value rising rapidly with the length. The strings 
 are usually about as long as a man's arm. It is called al-li-ko- 
 chik (in Yarok this signifies literally Indian money) not 
 
 Fig. 3. Al-li-ko-chik. 
 
 only on the Klaniath but from Crescent city to Eel river, 
 though the tribes using it speak several^ different languages. 
 When the Americans first arrived in the country an Indian 
 would give 40 or 60 dollars gold for a string, but now the 
 abundance of the supply has depreciated its value and it is 
 principally the old Indians who esteem it." Again he writes, 
 
 ^ Tribes of California, p. 21, 
 
16 PEIMITIVE SYSTEMS OF CURRENCY. 
 
 " Some of the young bloods array their Dulcineas for the dance 
 with lavish adornments, hanging on their dress 30, 40 or 50 
 dollars worth of dimes, quarter dollars and half dollars arranged 
 in strings." This shows that the new currency of silver is 
 treated by them in exactly the same way as the old shell 
 strings, both of them deriving their value as media of exchange 
 from the fact that they are the objects most universally prized 
 as ornaments for the person. 
 
 Elsewhere the same writer observes : " Immense quantities 
 of it (shell money) were formerly in circulation among the 
 Californian Indians, and the manufacture of it was large and 
 constant to replace the continual wastage caused by the sacrifice 
 of so much on the death of wealthy men, and by the propitiatory 
 sacrifices performed by many tribes, especially those of the 
 coast range. From my own observations, which have not been 
 limited, and from the statements of pioneers and of the Indians 
 themselves, I hesitate little to express the belief that every 
 Indian in the state in early days possessed an average of at 
 least 100 dollars worth of shell money. This would represent 
 the value of almost two women (though the Nishinam never 
 , actually bought their wives), or two grizzly bear skins, or 25 
 cinnamon bear skins or about three average ponies. The young 
 English-speaking Indians hardly use it at all except in a few 
 dealings with their elders or for gambling. One sometimes 
 lays away a few strings of it for he knows he cannot squander 
 it at the stores. It is singular how old Indians cling to this 
 currency when they know it will purchase nothing for them 
 at the stores ; but then their wants are few, and mostly supplied 
 from the sources of nature, and besides that the money has a 
 certain religious value in their eyes, as being alone worthy to 
 be offered up on the funeral pile of departed friends or famous 
 chiefs of their tribes^" 
 
 Here we see how amongst the Indian tribes there was a 
 fully developed system of inter-relations between the various 
 objects which formed their wealth. 
 
 The horse was but a new comer into America, but he had 
 his place soon allotted in the scale of values, being little less 
 
 1 Op. cH., p. 335. 
 
PRIMITIVE SYSTEMS OF CURRENCY. 17 
 
 valuable than a squaw. We cannot doubt that if the Indian 
 had succeeded in domesticating the buffalo before the advent 
 of the white man, it would have formed the most general 
 unit in use, as we shall find its congeners being employed in 
 all parts of the old world. But before the coming of the ' 
 Spaniards at least one race of North America had advanced a I 
 stage beyond shell money. The Aztecs' of Mexico were em- 
 ploying a currency of gold and cacao seeds. The former in the \ 
 shape of dust was placed in goose quills, which formed a natural \ 
 unit of capacity, for weights were as yet unknown to the Aztecs; j 
 whilst the cacao seeds were placed in bags, each containing 
 a specified number. 
 
 In Queen Charlotte Islands the dentalium shell was recog- 
 nized as a medium of exchange by most of the coast tribes, but 
 not so much as a medium of exchange for themselves as for 
 barter with the Indians of the interior. With the Haidas it is 
 still sometimes worn as an ornament though it has disappeared 
 as a medium of exchange. The blanket of the trader has now 
 however supplanted the skin as the principal unit. Not only 
 among the Haidas but all along the coast it takes the place of 
 the beaver-skin currency of the interior of British Columbia and 
 of the North West Territory. The blankets used in trade are 
 distinguished by the points or marks on the edge, woven into 
 their texture, the best being four-point, the smallest and 
 poorest one-point. The acknowledged unit of trade is a single 
 two and a half-point blanket, now worth a little over |1.60 
 Everything is referred to this unit, even a large four-point 
 blanket is said to be worth so many blankets. There is also 
 the "Copper," "an article of purely conventional value and 
 serving as money. This is a piece of native metal beaten out 
 into a flat sheet and made to take a peculiar shape. These 
 are not made by the Haidas — nor indeed is the native metal 
 known to exist in the islands, but are imported as articles of 
 great worth from the Chilcat country north of Sitka. Much 
 
 ' Clavigero, Hist, of Mexico, Vol. i. 386. 
 
 They counted the Cacao nuts by 8000 and to save the trouble of counting 
 them they reckoned them by sacks, every sack being reckoned to contain 24,000. 
 Of. Prescott, Conquest of Mexico, Vol. i. p. 44. 
 
 E. 2 
 
18 PRIMITIVE SYSTEMS OF CURRENCY. 
 
 attention is paid to the size and make of the copper, which 
 should be of uniform but not too great thickness, and should 
 give forth a good sound when struck with the hand. At the 
 present time spurious coppers have come into circulation, and 
 although these are easily detected by an expert, the value of 
 the copper is somewhat reduced and is often more nominal 
 than real. Formerly ten slaves were paid for a good copper as 
 a usual price, now they are valued at from forty to eighty 
 blankets".! It is obvious that such costly imported articles, 
 though now used as occasional higher units of account — much 
 as we employ fifty-pound notes — must have had some definite 
 use, owing to which they were so highly prized. The 
 attention paid to their tone would lead us to conjecture that 
 they were employed as a kind of gong, and further on we shall 
 find certain peoples of Further Asia paying a large price in 
 buffaloes for gongs. 
 
 Before we quit finally the northern latitudes, it is worth 
 our while to observe the method of currency employed by the 
 Icelanders. As metals and other products of the land were 
 scarce in their bleak home, the stockfish (dried cod) formed 
 naturally their chief commodity, and hence it appears on the 
 arms of Denmark as the emblem of Iceland. There is still 
 extant a proclamation for the regulation of English trade with 
 Iceland issued sometime between 1413 and 1426. As, mutatis 
 mutandis, it affords admirable insight into the methods by which 
 trade was carried on between men of different nations in the 
 emporia of the Mediterranean, and in fact everywhere else, it is 
 worth giving it in ecctenso'. 
 
 " I, iV. M. do proclaim here to-day a general market between 
 the English and the Icelandic men, who have come here with 
 peace and fair dealing, and between the Icelandic men and the 
 men of the islands who wish to carry on their trade here. 
 
 "First I proclaim this market on conditions of peace and 
 lawful security between one and the other, so that each can 
 entirely dispose of his own if he buy or if he sell. Price list in 
 
 1 G. M. Dawson, 'Report on the Queen Charlotte Islands, 1878,' p. 135 B 
 {Geological Suney of Canada), Montreal, 1880. 
 
 2 F. Magnusson, Nordiske TidsJerift for Oldkyndighed, ii. 112. 
 
PRIMITIVE SYSTEMS OF CURRENCY. 
 
 19 
 
 stockfish: of fish 2, 2^, or If lbs., 80 lbs. must be the equivalent 
 of a hundred (of cloth, i.e. 129 alens of vadme, a cloth formerly 
 used as a medium of exchange), provided the persons concerned 
 cannot agree as to the price. 
 
 Price of (foreign) goods. Stockfish. 
 
 48 alen of good and full width trade cloth . . 120 
 
 48 alen linen cloth double width . . . . 120 
 
 6 tonder (tuns) malt 120 
 
 4 do. trade flour 120 
 
 3 do. wheat 120 
 
 4 do. beer 120 
 
 1 tonde clean and clear butter . . . . 120 
 
 1 do. wine . 100 
 
 1 do. pitch 80 
 
 1 do. raw tar ...... 60 
 
 1 cask of iron, containing 400 pieces . . . 120 
 
 1^ tonde honey ....... 15 
 
 i do. blubber . . . . . . 15 
 
 ^ lb. of coppers (i.e. copper cauldrons) by weight 2i 
 
 1 pair black (leather) shoes 
 
 1 pair of women's shoes 
 
 1 trade rug .... 
 
 1 "alen" timber, in planks or spars 
 i tonde salt .... 
 
 ■J- lb. wax 
 
 3 
 
 30 
 5 
 5 
 5 
 
 20 
 
 Horse shoes of iron for 5 horses 
 Caps, knives, and other small mercer's wares, according 
 to mutual agreement. 
 "I charge all, not only the people from the country, but also 
 the inhabitants of these islands, that ye do in no way compass 
 any disorder or disturbance to the strangers, from the moment 
 the guard flag is hoisted, unless they themselves allow it. 
 
 "They, who here are annoyed by word or deed, have a right 
 to demand double idemnity therefor. 
 
 "Also I charge, and the merchants in no way the least, that 
 they use aright the "alen" and other lawful measure for every- 
 thing, as the law demands, especially as regards butter, wine 
 and beer, flour or malt, honey or tar, so that no one deals false 
 or with deceit with another. 
 
 2—2 
 
20 PRIMITIVE SYSTEMS OF CURRENCY. 
 
 "He who does so intentionally shall have sinned as greatly 
 against the state as if he had stolen goods of like value, whereas 
 the bargain becomes void, and damages moreover must be 
 given to him who was deceived. 
 
 "Let us now. Ye good men, eschew all malice and trickery, 
 riot or disturbance, quarrels and careless words: but let every 
 man be the other's friend, without deceit. 
 
 "Prizing unity 
 
 "And old custom, 
 
 "And abiding in God's peace." 
 
 Some such proclamations were probably often made in the 
 marts of the Aegean, such as Aegina, when Greek, Phoenician 
 and Etruscan met for traffic under the control of some local 
 potentate, and the protection of the god of some neighbouring 
 shrine. 
 
 Passing to the islands of the Pacific we shall find shell 
 money playing an important part among the primitive peoples, 
 such as those who inhabit New Ireland, New Britain, the 
 Pelew and the Caroline groups. It will suffice for our purpose 
 to describe the form in which it is employed in New Britain. 
 Mr Powell^ tells us that the native money in New Britain 
 consists of small cowrie shells strung on strips of cane, in Duke 
 of York Island it is called Dewarra. It is measured in lengths, 
 the first length being from hand to hand across the chest with 
 arms extended, second length from the centre of the breast to 
 the hand of one arm extended, the third from the shoulder to 
 the tip of the fingers along the arm, fourth from the elbow 
 to the tip of the fingers, fifth from the wrist to the tip of the 
 fingers, sixth finger lengths. Fish are generally bought by the 
 length in Dewarra unless they are too small. A large pig will 
 cost from 30 to 40 lengths of the first measure (fathom) and a 
 small one ten. The Dewarra is made up for convenience in 
 coils of 100 fathoms or first lengths; sometimes as many as- 
 600 fathoms are coiled together, but not often, as it would be 
 too bulky to remove quickly in case of invasion or war, when 
 the women carry it away to hide. These coils are very neatly 
 
 1 Wanderings in a Wild Gowntry, or Three Years among the Cannibak of 
 New Britain (London, 1883), p. 55. 
 
PRIMITIVE SYSTEMS OF CURRENCY. 21 
 
 covered with wickerwork like the bottom of our cane chairs.... 
 At Moko and Utuan they use another kind of money as well 
 as this, the other being a little bivalve shell, through which 
 they bore a hole and string it on pieces of native made twine'. 
 It is also chipped all round until it is a quarter of an inch in 
 diameter and then smoothed down into even discs with sand 
 and pumice. Here we iind strings of shells, which undoubtedly 
 in the first instance were used for personal adornment, con- 
 verted into a true currency. The simple savages whose pos- 
 sessions were exceedingly few and scanty, equated their fish to 
 strings of shells which formed their only ornament, and when 
 they got a more valuable possession in the pig, they quickly 
 learned to appraise that animal in shell worth, just as the 
 North American Indians learned to estimate the horse in 
 Wampum. Instead of shells the natives of Fiji are said to have 
 employed whales' teeth as currency, red teeth (which are still 
 highly prized) standing to white ones somewhat in the ratio of 
 sovereigns to shillings with us^. Passing on to the mainland of 
 Asia we shall find that the Chinese, who in the course of ages 
 have developed a bronze coinage of their own apart from the 
 influences of the Mediterranean people, had in early times an 
 elaborate system of shell money. Cowries appear in the Ya-King, 
 the oldest Chinese book, 100,000 dead shell fishes being an 
 equivalent for riches. Tortoise shell currency is also mentioned 
 in the same book. The tortoise of various kinds and sizes was 
 used for the greater values which would have required too many 
 cowries. Tortoise shell is still elegantly used to express coin. 
 Several kinds of Gypraea were used, including the purple shell, 
 two or three inches long; all the shells except the small ones were 
 employed in pairs. A writer of the second century B.C.' speaks 
 of the purple shell as ranking next after the sea tortoise shells, 
 measuring one foot six inches, which could only be procured / 
 in Cochin China and Annam, where they were used to make 
 
 1 For shell money in the Caroline Islands of. Kubary's EthnograpMsche 
 Beitrage zur Kenntnis des KaroUnen Archvpels (Leipzig, 1889); in the Pelew 
 Islands cf. Karl Semper, Die Pelau Inseln (Leipzig, 1873), p. 60; and for shell 
 money in general cf. R. Steam's Ethno-conchology (Washington, 1889)^ 
 
 " Jevons, Money, 25. 
 
 5 Terrien de la Couperie, Coins and Medals, p. 193. 
 
22 PRIMITIVE SYSTEMS OF CURRENCY. 
 
 pots, basins and other valuable objects. So attached were the 
 Chinese to these primitive coins that the usurper Wangmang 
 restored a shell currency of five kinds, tortoise shell being the 
 highest. From this time we hear no more of cowries in 
 China Proper, but they left traces of themselves in the small 
 copper coins shaped like a small Cypraea, called Dragon's eye 
 or Ant coins'. It is doubtless to a similar survival that we 
 owe those curious silver coins made in the shape of shells 
 which come from the north of Burmah and of which there are 
 
 Fig. 4. Burmese silver shell money. 
 
 several specimens in the British Museum. They are about the 
 s_ize of a cowrie, and doubtless served as a higher unit in a 
 currency, of which the lower units were formed by real shells. 
 
 In 685 B.C. in parts of China pearls and gems, gold, knives 
 and cloth were the money, and under the Shou dynasty 
 (1100 B.C.) we understand from ancient Commentaries that 
 the gold circulated in little cubes of a square inch, and the 
 copper in round, tongue-like plates by the tchin tchu, while 
 the silk cloth 2 feet 2 inches wide in rolls of 40 feet formed 
 a piece. 
 
 In the Shu King, when in 947 B.C. commutation for punish- 
 ment was enacted, the culprit according to the offence was to 
 pay 100, 200, 500 or 1000 hwars, or rings of copper weighing 
 6 ounces. The Chinese likewise used hoes as money, just as 
 we shall find the wild people of Annam doing at the present 
 hour. But in the course of time the hoe became a true 
 currency and little hoes, such as that here figured, were em- 
 ployed as coins in some parts of China (fern, agricultural 
 implements). The copper knives which played so important 
 a part in the development of Chinese coinage will be dealt 
 
 ' Terrien de la Couperie, CoiTis and Medals, p. 199. 
 
PRIMITIVE SYSTEMS OF CURRENCY. 
 
 23 
 
 with more particularly in a later chapter. In Marco Polo's 
 time cowries were in full use, as in the province of Yunnan'. 
 
 Pio. 5. Chinese hoe money. 
 
 On the borders of China and Tibet we may still find a 
 state of things not far removed from that existing in the 
 China of 2000 years ago". The Tibetans, who in recent years 
 employ Indian rupees, for purposes of small change cut up 
 these coins into little pieces, which are weighed by the careful 
 Chinese, but the Tibetans do not seem to use the scale, and 
 roughly judge of the value of a piece of silver. Tea, more- 
 over, and beads of turquoise are largely used as a means of 
 payment instead of metal. 
 
 Speaking of this same region (called by him Kandu), Polo 
 says' : " The money-matters of the people are conducted in this 
 way: they have gold in rods which they weigh, and they 
 reckon its value by its weight in saggi, but they have no 
 coined money. Their small change again is made in this 
 way : they have salt which they boil and set in a mould, and 
 every piece from the mould weighs half-a-pound. Now eighty 
 moulds of this salt are worth one saggio of fine gold." Tea 
 seems to have taken the place of salt in modern times. 
 
 Turning next to the southern frontier of China, we shall 
 find among the tribes of Annam a system of currency which 
 strongly reminds us of that found in the Homeric Poems. 
 
 Among the Bahnars of Annam who border on Laos, " every- 
 thing," says that excellent observer M. Aymonier, "is by barter, 
 hence all objects of general use have a known relationship: if 
 we know the unit, all the rest is easy. Here is the key: a 
 
 ' Yule's Translation, Vol. ii. p. 70. 
 '' Gill, River of Golden Sand, ii. p. 77. 
 " Yule's Translation, Vol. ii. p. 45. 
 
 ^ 
 
24 PRIMITIVE SYSTEMS OF CURRENCY. 
 
 head, that is to say, a male slave is worth six or seven 
 buffaloes, or the same number of pots {marmites ; so in Homer, 
 II. XXXIII. 885, an ox is estimated at a kettle); the buffalo and 
 the pot have the same value, which naturally varies with the 
 size and age of the animal and the size and quality of the pot. 
 
 " A full-grown buffalo or a large pot is worth seven earthen- 
 ware jars of a grey glaze, after the Chinese shape, and with 
 a capacity of fifteen litres. One jar = 4 muk. (The muh^ is 
 an unit of account, but .originally meant some special article.) 
 1 muk =10 mats, that is to say ten of these hoes, which are 
 manufactured by the Cedans, and which are employed by all 
 the savages of this region as their agricultural implement. 
 The hoe is the smallest amount used by the Bahnars. It is 
 worth 10 centimes in European goods, and is made of iron^" 
 Thus the buffalo is worth 280 hoes, or a little more than an 
 English sovereign, since each hoe is worth a penny (10 centimes). 
 The Bahnars have sheet tin ^ millim. thick cut into pieces 11 
 centim. square, to be used to ornament sword-belts or to make 
 earrings (iv. p. 390). A stick of virgin wax the size of an 
 ordinary candle = 1 hoe, a pretty little cane hat = 2 hoes ; a 
 large bamboo hat = 2 hoes ; a Bahnar knife = 2 hoes ; a fine 
 sword and sheath = 1 jar, 1 muk, 3 hoes ; a crossbow and 
 string = 3 hoes ; ordinary arrows are sold at 30 for 1 hoe ; 
 arrows with movable heads, 20 for 1 hoe, and poisoned arrows 
 5 for 1 hoe ; a lance-head = 3 hoes ; a lance with palm handle 
 = 4 hoes ; a horse = 3 or 4 pots or buffaloes ; a large elephant 
 = 10 to 15 heads (slaves). 
 
 The same method of using the buffalo as the chief unit 
 is employed by the Mois, among whom a slave is reckoned 
 at 10 buffaloes. Again, among tribes such as the Tjams, 
 with whom the string of copper cash (or sapecs) borrowed 
 from the Chinese, is employed as their lowest unit, a full- 
 grown buffalo = 100 strings f the Mexican piastre or dollar 
 
 ' So the Irish sed, the most general name for chattel, originally meant 
 simply an ox. 
 
 2 Cochin-Chine Frangaise. Excursions et Reconnaissances, xiii. (1877), p. 
 296—8. 
 
 ' Excursions et Reconnaissances, xiii. No. 30 (1887), p. 296 — 304. 
 
PRIMITIVE SYSTEMS OF CURRENCY. 25 
 
 circulates freely as in China, a small pig costs 10 strings, ' 
 pork by retail costs two strings per lb. (livre), ducks cost 
 1 J to 2 strings. A large caldron costs 3 buffaloes ; a hand- 
 some gong = 2 buffaloes ; a small gong = 1 buffalo ; 6 copper 
 platters = 1 buffalo ; two swords = 1 buffalo ; 2 lances = 1 
 buffalo ; a rhinoceros' horn = 8 buffaloes ; a pair of large ele- 
 phants' tusks = 6 buffaloes ; a small pair = 3 buffaloes. When 
 the wild people have dealings with the more civilized peoples 
 of the plain, who employ the Chinese cash and silver dollars, 
 a large buffalo = 100 strings of cash, a small one = 50 strings ; 
 a fine horse = 100 strings ; a she goat = a piece of cloth. The 
 Orang Glai have often to buy elephants' tusks, at the rate of 
 8 buffaloes for a pair, or 8 bars of silver (640 francs). The 
 Szins of Kharang have often to pay a tax of a buffalo per 
 hut, or for the whole village 10 buffaloes, the horns of which 
 must be at least as long as their ears'. In Cambodia iron 
 ingots^ form a special kind of money. These ingots are not 
 weighed, but they are as long as from the base of the thumb to 
 the tip of the forefinger ; they are in breadth two fingers, and 
 one finger in thickness in the middle, tapering off to either end. 
 
 Cowries and other shells seem to have gone out of use alto- 
 gether among these tribes, but we may recognize in the practice 
 of reckoning the cash by the string a distinct survival of the 
 olden time when shells were so employed. It is of great im- 
 portance to note that where silver has come into use, its unit, 
 the bar, is equated to the buffalo, the unit of barter, just as we 
 find the Homeric gold Talent equal to the ox. 
 
 Next let us turn to India, and to the Aryans of the Rig 
 Veda, who dwelt in the north-west of the Punjaub at the time 
 when we first meet them. From their prayers and invocations 
 it is easy to learn in what the wealth of this simple folk con- 
 sisted. One or two examples will serve for our purpose : " The 
 potent ones who bestow on us good fortune by means of cows, 
 horses, goods, gold, Indra and Vaya, may they, blessed with 
 fortune, ever be successful by means of horses and heroes in 
 
 ' M. Aymonier, Cochin-Chine. Excursions et Reconnaissances, Vol. x. No. 24 
 (1885), pp. 233 seqq. 
 2 lUd. p. 317. 
 
26 PRIMITIVE SYSTEMS OF CURRENCY. 
 
 battled" Again, " Indra bring us rice cake, a thousand soina 
 drinks, and an hundred cows, hero. Bring us apparel, cows, 
 horses and jewels, along with a mana of gold." Yet once more : 
 "Ten horses, ten caskets, ten garments, ten gold nuggets 
 (hiranya pindas) I received from Divodasa. Ten chariots 
 equipped with side horses, and an hundred cows gave the 
 A^vatha to the Atharvans and to the Payu." Even without 
 further evidence than that which we have already drawn from 
 the wild people of Annam, we might well assume that there 
 were definitely fixed relations in value between the cows, 
 horses, gold, rice, and cloth of the Vedic people. But absolute 
 proof is at hand, for their close kinsmen, the ancient Persians, 
 have left us in the Zend Avesta ample means of observing 
 their monetary system. Thus we read in the ordinances which 
 fix the payment of the physician that " he shall heal the priest 
 for the holy blessing ; he shall heal the master of an house for 
 the value of an ox of low value ; he shall heal the lord of a 
 borough for the value of an ox of average value ; he shall heal 
 the lord of a town for the value of an ox of high value ; he 
 shall heal the lord of a province for the value of a chariot and 
 four ; he shall heal the wife of the master of a house for the 
 value of a she ass ; he shall heal the wife of the master of a 
 borough for the value of a cow ; he shall heal the wife of the 
 lord of a town for the value of a mare ; he shall heal the wife 
 of the lord of a province for the value of a she camel ; he shall 
 heal the son of the lord of a borough for the value of an ox of 
 high value : he shall heal an ox of high value for the value of 
 an ox of average value ; he shall heal an ox of average value 
 for the value of an ox of low value ; he shall heal an ox of low 
 value for the value of a sheep ; and he shall heal a sheep for 
 the value of a meal of meat^." So too in the fees of the Cleanser 
 we read : " Thou shalt cleanse a priest for a blessing ; the lord 
 of a province for the value of a camel of high value ; the lord 
 of a town for the value of a stallion ; the lord of a borough for 
 the value of a bull ; the master of an house for the value of a 
 
 1 Rig-Veda, Mandala, vii. 90. 6, Tin. 67. 1—2, vi. 47, 23—4. 
 
 2 Vendidad, Fasgard, vii. 41 (Darmesteter's translation in Sacred Books o{ 
 the East). 
 
PRIMITIVE SYSTEMS OF CURRENCY. 27 
 
 COW three years old ; the wife of the master of an house for the 
 value of a ploughing cow ; a menial for the value of a draught 
 cow ; a young child for the value of a lamb'." Again in the 
 chapter on Contracts : " The third is the contract to the amount 
 of a sheep, the fourth is the contract to the amount of an ox, 
 the fifth is the contract to the amount of a man (human being), 
 the sixth is the contract to the amount of a field, a field in 
 good land, a fruitful one in good bearing''." 
 
 From these extracts it is plain that the ancient Persians 
 had a system of clearly defined relations in value between all 
 their worldly gear, whether the object was a slave or an ox, or 
 a lamb or a field, precisely like that existing at the present 
 moment among the hill tribes of Annam. But not simply was 
 it between one kind of animal and another, but they had 
 evidently strict jotions as regards the inter-relations in value 
 of^fferent animals of the same "kihcJ; tlius tlie ox of high 
 value, the ox of low value, the cow of three years old, or the 
 bull all stood to one another in a fixed relationship. We may 
 without hesitation conclude that the same system of conven- 
 tional values prevailed among the ancient Hindus. Nor can 
 we doubt that articles of every kind, such as arrows, spears, 
 axes, and articles of personal use and adornment all had their 
 regularly recognized prices, and that the less valuable of them 
 were used as small change. Gold, no doubt, occupied an im- 
 portant place in relation to the other forms of property in 
 portions of fixed size or weight, as in the days of Marco Polo. 
 In mediaeval times in parts of India money consisted of pieces 
 of iron worked into the form of large needles, and in some parts 
 stones which we call cat's eyes, and in others pieces of gold 
 worked to a certain weight were used for moneys, as we are told 
 by Nicolo Conti, who travelled in India in the 15th century'. 
 If iron was so employed at this late date we may well infer 
 that bronze and afterwards iron were probably so used by the 
 ancient Indo-Iranian people. 
 
 Among the fishermen who dwelt along the shores of the 
 Indian Ocean, from the Persian Gulf to the southern shores of 
 
 1 Vendid&d, Fasgard, ix. 37. ' Ibid. iv. 2. 
 
 3 Hakluyt Society, 1857, p. 35. 
 
28 
 
 PRIMITIVE SYSTEMS OF CURRENCY. 
 
 Hindustan, Ceylon and the Maldive islands, it would appear 
 that the fish-hook, to them the most important of all imple- 
 ments, passed as currency. In the course of time it became a 
 true money, just as did the hoe in China. It still for a time 
 retained its ancient form, but gradually became degraded into 
 a simple piece of double wire, as seen in Nos. 3 and 4 of our 
 
 3. i. 
 
 Fig. 6. Fish-hook money {Larina). 
 
 illustration. In its conventional form it is known as a larin 
 or lari, a name doubtless derived from Lari on the Persian Gulf 
 These larins made both of silver and bronze were in use until 
 the beginning of the last century, and bear legends in Arabic 
 character. Had the process of degradation gone on without 
 check, in course of time the double wire would probably have 
 shrunk up into a bullet-shaped mass of metal, just as the 
 ^/Siamese silver coins are the outcome of a process of degrada- 
 
PRIMITIVE SYSTEMS OF CURRENCY. 
 
 29 
 
 C. 
 
 Fig. 7. Siamese silver bullet money : A. B. Early form as simple piece of wire. 
 C. Last stage of degradation. 
 
 -V 
 
 tion froTn a piece of silver wire twisted into the form of a 
 ring and doubled up, which probably originally formed some kind 
 of ornament. The bullet shaped tical is now struck as a coin of 
 European form. Just as perhaps the silver shells of Burmah be- 
 
 came the multiple unit of a large number of real cowries, so the 
 fish-hook made of silver came into use as a multiple unit, when 
 the bronze fish-hook had already become conventionalized into 
 a true coin. The silver larins of Ceylon weigh about 170 grs. 
 troy, alid those of Southern India are said by Professor Wilson 
 to weigh the same, although some of them weigh only 76 grs. 
 or less than half. As the rupee weighs about 180 grs. the 
 silver fish-hook may represent the usual unit employed for 
 silver, strong national conservatism requiring that the silver 
 currency should take the same form as the ancient fish-hook 
 currency of bronze'. There are still in circulation in Nejd in 
 Arabia small bars of silvered brass, which bear on the back 
 Arabic inscriptions. It is hardly possible to doubt that in these 
 little pieces of metal we have the last surviving descendants of 
 
 ' For larins cf. Prof. Ehys Davids, " On the Ancient Coins and Measures of 
 Ceylon" {Numismata Orientalia, Vol. i. 68 — 73). Mr Ehys Davids makes no 
 mention of the bronze fish-hooks, but there are a number of them in the British 
 Museum. 
 
30 
 
 PRIMITIVE SYSTEMS OF CURRENCY. 
 
 the old fish-hook. In the Maldive Isles a silver larin was 
 worth 12,000 cowries. 
 
 Fig. 8. Silvered brass bars used as money in Nejd '. 
 
 Advancing westward we find the Ossetes of the Caucasus 
 at the present moment employ the cow as their unit of 
 value, the prices of all commodities being stated as one, two, 
 three or four cows, or even at one-tenth or one-hundredth of 
 the value of a cow. The ox is worth two cows, and the cow is 
 worth ten sheep. This people regulate compensation for wounds 
 thus : they measure the length of the wound in barley corns, 
 and for every barley com which it measures a cow has to be 
 paid^. We can have little doubt that over all Hither Asia the 
 same method of employing the cow as the principal unit of 
 value obtained. It is- that which we found among the Greeks 
 of the Homeric Poems, who were in full contact with Northern 
 Asia Minor, and was almost certainly that of the Semites who 
 dwelt in the South. Just as we find the buffalo, and the pots, 
 bronze platters, arrows, lances and hoes standing side by side 
 in well defined mutual relation among the Bahnars of Cochin 
 China, so we find in Homer that whilst the cow is the principal 
 unit,' the slave is employed as an occasional higher unit, and 
 the kettle (lehes), the pot (tripous), the axe and the half axe, 
 
 1 I am indebted to the kindness of Mr A. Galetly of tbe Edinburgh Museum 
 of Science and Art for the drawing from which the figure here shown is 
 reproduced, as also for the drawing of the Calabar wire money and West African 
 axe money figured lower down. My friend Mr J. G. Frazer (one out of 
 countless kindnesses) called my attention to all three objects. 
 
 ^ Haxthausen, Transkaukasia ii. p. 30 (Engl. Trans, p. 409). 
 
PRIMITIVE SYSTEMS OF CURRENCY. 31 
 
 hides, raw copper and pig iron stand beside the cow as multiples 
 or sub-multiples. When Ajax and Idomeneus make a bet on 
 the issue of the chariot race, the proposed wager is a pot or 
 a kettle', whilst frOm another passage we learn that the usual 
 prizes given at the funeral games of a chieftain were female 
 slaves and pots (Tripods).' 
 
 Passing from Greece into Italy we have no difficulty 
 in proving that the cow was the regular unit of value in 
 that peninsula and the adjacent island of Sicily. Down to 
 451 B.C. all fines at Rome were paid in cows and sheep. By 
 the Tarpeian Law these were commuted for payments in' 
 copper, each cow being set at 100 asses, each sheep at 10 asses. 
 As I shall deal with the whole question of the Roman As at con- 
 siderable length later on I shall here simply note that the Italian 
 tribes had evidently the same system of adjusting the relations 
 between their cattle and sheep and their metals which we found 
 among the Persians and modern Ossetes. In Sicily it is clear 
 that the cow had played the same part as elsewhere, for we 
 learn from Aristotle'' that when the tyrant Dionysius burdened 
 the Syracusans by excessive taxation, they ceased in a ^reat 
 degree to keep cattle, inasmuch as the unit of assessment was 
 • the cow. If then in the 4th century B.C. at Syracuse, the most 
 advanced coramimity in Sicily, the cow still continued to be 
 the unit of assessment, d fortiori, at an earlier period that 
 animal must have been the monetary unit of the whole island. 
 
 From the Italians we pass on to their close kinsmen the 
 Kelts. We are told by Polybius^ that when the Gauls entered 
 Italy, their wealth consisted of their cattle and gold ornaments, 
 but although an argument will be offered below to show that 
 the cow was the monetary unit of both Gauls and Germans, 
 we have no definite evidence respecting the barter system. 
 But fortunately the Ancient Laws of Wales and Ireland 
 afford us ample insight into the Keltic system. Irish tradition 
 goes back far beyond the date at which the Brehon LaWs were 
 compiled, and from it we get a glimpse of a system almost 
 Homeric: thus we read in the Annals of the Four Masters 
 
 ' II. XXIII. 485. ^ Oecon. ii. 21. 
 
 a II. 18. 
 
32 PRIMITIVE SYSTEMS OF CURRENCY. 
 
 under the year 106 A.D. that the tribute {Boroimhe, literally 
 cow-tax) paid by the King of Leinster consisted in 150 cows, 
 150 swine, 150 couples of men and women in servitude, 150 
 girls and the king's daughter in like servitude, 150 caldrons, 
 with two passing large ones of the breadth and depth of five 
 fists'. As this tradition makes no mention of payment in 
 metals, but only of slaves, cattle and caldrons, which doubtless 
 stood to one another in well defined relations, we need have no 
 hesitation in assuming that the cow formed the chief unit of 
 the earlier, as it did of the later Kelts. 
 
 The Welsh naturally adopted the monetary system which 
 sprang up after the reign of Constantine the Great in the Later 
 Empire. Accordingly we find in certain of their Ancient Laws" 
 tables giving in denarii, solidi or librae the values of various 
 kinds of property. From these we can learn with accuracy the re- 
 lations in value which existed between various kinds of property. 
 Thus the calf from March (when the cows calved) to November 
 was worth 6 denarii, to the following February 8 den., till May 
 10 den., till August of the second year 12, till November 14 
 dew.,, till February 15 den., till February of the third year 28 den. 
 The heifer is then in calf her milk is worth 16 den. Thus the 
 milch cow is worth 46 den., and up to August she is worth 
 48 den., up to November 50 den., and up to May of the fourth 
 year is worth 60 den. A month's milk is worth 4 den. ; a bull 
 calf 6 den., the young ox when put to the plough is worth 28 
 den., when he can plough, 48 den., that is the same as the 
 young milch cow of the same age; a gelding is worth 80 den., 
 a farmer's mare 60 den., a trained horse is worth half a libra; 
 a bow with twelve arrows is worth 7 denarii and an obolus ; a 
 queen bee {modred of) is worth 24 den., the first swarm 16 den., 
 the second 12, the third 8; a foal is worth 18 den. to 24 den., 
 a two year old 48 den., a three year old 96 den. A young male 
 slave {iuvenis captivus) is worth 1 libra, a slave both young and 
 of large stature (captivus iuvenis et magnus) is worth 1^ libra. 
 It would appear that the Welsh, when taking over the Roman 
 system, had adjusted their own highest barter-unit, the slave 
 
 • Annals of the Four Masters, Anno 106 a.d. (O'Donovau's ed.). 
 " Ancient Laws of Wales, p. 795. 
 
PRIMITIVE SYSTEMS OF CURRENCY. 33 
 
 (probably female as well as male), to the libra or pound, the 
 highest unit in the Roman system. Of course slaves of ex- 
 ceptional strength or beauty would always command a higher 
 price. But the regulations for the value of cattle are especially 
 of interest, as shewing the extraordinary minuteness with which 
 pastoral peoples discriminate the values of animals of different 
 ages, and estimate the milk of a cow in proportion to her actual 
 value. The full-grown cow is worth exactly ten times the new- 
 bom calf, an estimate which holds good just as much in 1890 
 as it did 1000 years ago, for it is not a mere convention but is 
 based upon a natural law. At the present moment a calf is 
 worth from 30 to 35 shillings, a cow from £15 to £17. 10s. 
 The yearling calf was worth one-sixth of the full-grown cow, 
 a relation which still holds good. 
 
 The Irish Kelts borrowed their silver system from Rome 
 at a period probably before Constantino, as they seem never to 
 have employed the libra and solidus, but simply the uncia 
 {vmga) and scripulus (screapall), adding thereto a subdivision 
 called the pinginn or penny, borrowed doubtless from the 
 Saxon invader at a later period. Thus 1 unga= 24 screapalls; 
 1 screapall = 3 pinginns. They ecLuated the principal silver 
 unit, the uncia, to the old chief barter-unit, the cow (bo). As 
 elsewhere, however, the slave formed occasionally the highest 
 unit, and was reckoned nominally at three cows. The slave 
 woman (cumhal, ancilla in Latin writers) was in course of time 
 used as a mere unit of account. 
 
 Slave woman (cumhal, ancilla) ■— 3 ounces (vmga) 
 
 Full-grown cow (bo mor) = 1 ounce = 24 screapalls 
 
 Heifer now in third year (samhaisc) = ^ ounce =12 screapalls 
 
 Heifer of second year (colpach) = 6 screapalls 
 
 Yearling (dairt) - 4 screapalls 
 
 A cow's milk for summer and harvest = 6 screapalls 
 
 A sheep = 3 screapalls 
 
 A goat's milk for summer and harvest = If pinginn 
 
 A sheep's fleece = 1| pinginn 
 
 A sheep's milk = | pinginn 
 
 A kid (meinnan) ' = | pinginn. 
 
 1 O'Donovan's Supplement to O'Eeilly, s.v. Lacht : Senchus Mor, i. 287. 
 R. 3 
 
34 PRIMITIVE SYSTEMS OF CURRENCY. 
 
 Here again the yearling is worth one-sixth of the cow. 
 Gold was abundant among the ancient Irish, (almost certainly 
 obtained in large quantities from the Wicklow mountains,) and 
 passed from hand to hand in the form of rings, which were 
 weighed on a system different from and probably far older 
 than that employed for silver (see Appendix A). 
 
 Passing to the Teutonic peoples we find traces of the same 
 ancient practice. For according to one system a mancus of 
 silver (a mere unit of account) corresponded with the value of 
 an ox. Similarly the pound {libra) was generally regarded- as 
 the silver equivalent of the worth of a man\ But the strongest 
 proof is that Charlemagne in his dealings with the Saxons 
 found it necessary to define the value of his solidus of 12 pence 
 (denarii) by equating it to the value of an ox of a year old of 
 either sex in the autumn season, just as it is sent to the stall. 
 In the same law we find a list of regulation prices for other 
 commodities, such as oats, honey, rye, similar to those already 
 quoted from the Welsh laws^. The English word fee, which 
 originally meant an ox, as is shown not only by the German 
 Vieh, which still retains its original meaning, and by such 
 expressions in Anglo-Saxon as gangende feoh, is in itself a proof 
 that cattle served as the most generally recognized form of 
 money. It might be expected that much the same state of 
 things existed among the Scandinavian peoples. Their chief 
 media of exchange were cows, and woollen cloths, slaves, and 
 gold ornaments. By the laws of Hakon the Good penalties 
 cotild be paid in cows, provided that they were not too old, 
 
 ' Thorpe, Laws of the Anglo-Saxons, i. 357. Cunningham, History of 
 English Commerce, i. 117. 
 
 2 Illud notandum est quales debeut solidi esse Saxonum : id est, bovem 
 annoticum utriusque sexus, autumnali tempore, sicut in stabulum mittitnr, pro 
 uno solido : similiter et vemum tempus, quando de stabulo exiit; et deinoeps, 
 quantum aetatem auxerit, tantum in pretio creseat. De annona vero bortrinis 
 pro solido uno scapilos quadraginta donant et de sigule viginti. Septem- 
 trionales autem pro solidum scapilos triginta de avena et sigule quindeoim. 
 Mel vero pro solido bortrensi, sigla una et medio donant. Septemtrionales 
 autem duos siolos de melle pro uno solido donent. Item ordeum mundum sicut 
 et sigule pro uno solido donent. In argento duodecim denarios solidum faciant. 
 Et in aliis speciebus ad istum pretium omnem aestimationem compositiouis 
 sunt. Capitulare Saxonicum, ii. Migne, xcvii. 202. 
 
PRIMITIVE SYSTEMS OF CURRENCY. 35 
 
 in slaves, provided they were not under fifteen years of age, 
 in cloths, and in weapons ^ 
 
 Gold and silver were employed by the northern peoples in 
 the form of rings. 
 
 This has led people to talk much about ring money as if 
 it was a true currency, circulating like the stamped money 
 of later times. The truer view seems to be that these rings, 
 whether employed by the ancient Egyptians or the prehistoric 
 inhabitants of Mycenae, the Kelts or Teutons, were nothing 
 more than ornaments and passed in the ordinary way of barter, 
 having a recognized distinct relation to other forms of property, 
 such as cattle and slaves. It has been the custom in all coun- 
 tries for the person who desires to have an article of jewellery 
 made to give to the goldsmith a certain weight of gold or 
 silver, out of which the latter manufactures the desired orna- 
 ment. Such is the practice at the present day in India; you 
 give the goldsmith so many gold mohurs or sovereigns, or 
 rupees, as the case may be; he squats down in your verandah, 
 and with a few primitive tools quickly turns out the article you 
 desire, which of course v/ill weigh as many mohurs or sovereigns 
 as you have given him (provided that you have stood by all the 
 time, keeping a sharp look-out to prevent his abstracting any 
 of the metal). That in like fashion gold ornaments for ordinary 
 wearing purposes were regularly of known weights in ancient 
 times is shown clearly by the account of the presents given to 
 Kebekah by Abraham's servant, ' a gold earring of half a shekel 
 weight and two bracelets for her hands of ten shekels weight ' 
 (Genesis xxiv. 22). The same word appears in Job xlii. 11: 
 ' Then came there unto him all his brethren and all his sisters 
 and all that had been of his acquaintance before... every man 
 also gave him a piece of money and every one an earring of 
 gold.' Consequently Rebekah's golden ring (whether it was 
 to adorn her nose or ear) of half a shekel weighed 65 grains, 
 being half the light shekel or ox-unit. We are not told the 
 weight of the earrings contributed by his sympathetic kinsfolk 
 for the afflicted patriarch, but it is evident that they were of a 
 uniform standard. No doubt such rings had from time im- 
 ^ Sohive and Holmboe, Norges Mynter (Christiania, 1865), pp. i — iii. 
 
 3—2 
 
36 PRIMITIVE SYSTEMS OF CTJREENCY. 
 
 memorial passed in the ordinary course of barter from hand to 
 hand. This is strongly supported by a piece of evidence 
 produced independently of the previous suggestion by Dr 
 Hoffmann of Kiel, who has showed' that betzer (1X3), the word 
 used for gold in Job xxii. 24 — 25 (betzer) and in Job xxxvi. 19 
 (b'tzar), from a comparison of its cognates in Hebrew and 
 Arabic means simply a ring, which through the extended 
 meaning ring-gold came finally to be used as a name for 
 the metal simply. To take another example from a very dif- 
 ferent region, the golden ornaments of the ancient Irish (of 
 which numerous specimens exist in the Museum of the Royal 
 Irish Academy) were made according to specified weight. 
 Thus queen Medbh is represented as saying : ' My spear-brooch 
 of gold, which weighs thirty ungas, and thirty half ungas, and 
 thirty crosachs and thirty quarter [crosachs].' O'Curry, Man- 
 ners and Customs of Ancient Irish, iii. 112. But we need not 
 go beyond Greek soil itself for such illustrations. The well- 
 known story of Archimedes and the weight of the golden crown, 
 which led to the discovery of specific gravity, is sufficient to 
 show that the practice in Greece was such as I describe. 
 
 The rings seen on Egyptian monuments (of which we give a 
 representation in a later chapter) are of round wire ; those 
 found by Schliemann in the tombs of Mycenae^ (Fig. 9) consist 
 both of round wire rings like the Egyptian, and likewise of 
 spirals of quadrangular wire. As finger rings (BaKTiiXioi) are 
 not mentioned in Homer, it has been assumed that the Homeric 
 Greeks did not employ rings at all. Hence in a famous passage 
 where the ornaments made by Hephaestus for the goddesses 
 are described, we find mention of brooches, bent spirals (e\i,Ke<;) 
 ear-drops^, and chains. Helbig' explains the helikes as a 
 kind of brooch made of four spirals, such as are worn in parts 
 of Central Europe, but it is difiicult to believe that people who 
 were using brooches with pins and necklaces would not have 
 known and employed the far simpler ring. Again, why should 
 
 1 G. Hoffmann, Zeitschrift fiir Assyriologie, Vol. ii. (1887) p. 48. 
 ' Schliemann, Mycenae, and Tirym, p. 354. 
 
 ' II. XVIII. 401 vSpiras re, yva/iTrTds e' ^iKas, KdXvKds re, koI op/ious. 
 * Hmier. Epos, 279—281 (2nd ed.). 
 
PRIMITIVE SYSTEMS OF CUBEENCY. 37 
 
 we find two distinct words for brooches coming thus together? 
 Is it not far more likely that in the spirals of Mycenae we have 
 
 Fig. 9. Bings found in the tombs of Mycenae. 
 
 the real bent helikes of Homer ? These spirals would serve not 
 only for finger rings, but might be used in the hair, or more 
 probably still were used as a means of fastening on the dress, 
 being passed through eyelet holes or loops, on the principle of 
 the modern key ring\ On comparing them with the Scandi- 
 navian spiral (Fig. Ijjthe reader will see that this primitive 
 form of employing gold was widely diffused over Europe. The 
 Scandinavians used such ornaments of bent wire (O.N. baugr, 
 A.S. beag from root bug, to bend) very commonly, beside oxen 
 and other property, as media of exchange. Thus both beag in 
 Anglo-Saxon, and baugr in Old Norse became used as general 
 names for treasure. Thus baugbrota (cf hring hrota), literally 
 
 ' Hesyehiua s.v. ?Xikcs explains them as earrings (eycirio), or armlets, anklets 
 (\j/4\\ta), or rings {SaKriXioi). Eustathius on Iliad xviii. 400 explains them as 
 ivurria v \j/iX\ia irapa. ri els KiKKov iUiraeaBai., " earrings or armlets (anklets), 
 so called from being rolled up" {helissesthai). Cp. Ebeling, Lexicon Homericum, 
 s.v. ?Xif. 
 
38 
 
 PRIMITIVE SYSTEMS OF CUERENCY. 
 
 ring-breaker, was used as an epithet of princes, meaning dis- 
 tributor of treasure^. 
 
 The same spirals of quadrangular wire were probably em- 
 ployed by the Kelts, as that shown in Fig. 10, No. 3 was found 
 
 Fig. 10. Nos. 1, 2, found in Tipperary ; 3, Scandinavian ; 4, 5, found in 
 Co. Mayo ; 6, 7, 8, ordinary Irish type. 
 
 in Ireland; Nos. 4 and 5 are of quadrangular wire but are 
 simple hoops, whilst in Nos. 6, 7, 8, we get the regular Irish 
 type of a round wire not completely closed". The latter 
 probably represent a more advanced state of art, as their 
 makers must have had considerable metallurgic skill. No. 8 
 being made of gold plated over a copper core. 
 
 As we shall see further on, the Egyptian rings are made on 
 a standard almost identical with the Homeric talent, and I 
 have shown elsewhere that the rings from Mycenae were made 
 on almost the same standard'. I shall endeavour to show iu 
 an Appendix that the Irish rings also show evidence of being 
 
 ' Keary, Catalogue of Anglo-Saxon Coins, i. p. vii. From beag Mr Max 
 Miiller derives buy in spite of a phonetic diiBoulty. 
 
 2 Nos. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 are in the collection of my friend Mr E. Day, F.S.A., of 
 Cork. The others are in my own possession. 
 
 ^ Journal of HelUuic Studies, Vol. a. Here is the description and weight 
 
PRIMITIVE SYSTEMS OF CURRENCY. 
 
 39 
 
 made on a definite standard, whilst it has been long well known 
 that the Scandinavian rings and armlets have likewise a 
 standard of their own. 
 
 When occasion arose they cut off a piece of this bent wire 
 (for it was really nothing more), and gave it by weight. 
 Such a piece was called a scillinga, and is the direct ancestor 
 of our own shilling^. It is not unlikely also that the ancient 
 inhabitants of Portugal employed similar pieces of wire, as 
 Strabo tells us that the Lusitanians have no money, but that 
 they employ silver wire, from which they cut off a portion 
 when necessary". 
 
 "We now pass on to Africa, where we shall find most varied 
 systems of currency. Thus on the West Coast of Africa the 
 har is the unit. In fact all merchandise is reckoned by the 
 bar', which now at Sierra Leone means 2s. 3d worth of any kind 
 
 of the rings (which I have been enabled to figure by the kindness of Mr John 
 Murray) : 
 
 
 
 Weioht 
 
 Metal 
 
 Desceiption 
 
 
 
 
 
 Grammes 
 
 Gkains Tkot 
 
 Silver 
 
 Plain ring 
 
 8-8 
 
 137 
 
 Gold 
 
 Spiral 
 
 8-5 
 
 132 
 
 J 
 
 ^^ 
 
 9-9 
 
 153 
 
 ^^ 
 
 ^_ 
 
 10-8 
 
 167 
 
 tt 
 
 Plain ring 
 
 15-9 
 
 248 
 
 
 ^^ 
 
 16-5 
 
 267 
 
 
 ^1 
 
 190 
 
 297 
 
 
 _ 
 
 19-4 
 
 303 
 
 "^ 
 
 Spiral 
 
 20-5 
 
 320 
 
 ,, 
 
 ), 
 
 21-5 
 
 335 
 
 ,^ 
 
 Plain ring 
 
 22-0 
 
 340 
 
 ^, 
 
 Spiral 
 
 ■29-3 
 
 452 
 
 
 '' 
 
 39-0 
 
 612 
 
 ), 
 
 
 39-5 
 
 617 
 
 
 
 41-5 
 
 643 
 
 
 
 42-2 
 
 654 
 
 
 
 42-3 
 
 655 
 
 " 
 
 " 
 
 42-8 
 
 662 
 
 ' Cf. Keary's Catalogue of English Coins in the British Museum, p. 6. 
 ^ Strabo iii. p. 155. &vtI 5k vofd(rfi,aTos oi Xioc h> jSaSei (popriav d/ioi;85 XP^"'^"''- 
 ■i} TOv dpy^pov iXdyfiaros dTTOT^fivovTes diS6a(nv, 
 
 » Gordon Lang, Traveh in Western Africa (1825), Prefatory Note. 
 
40 
 
 PRIMITIVE SYSTEMS OF CURRENCY. 
 
 of commodity, although originally it meant simply an iron bar 
 of fixed dimensions, which formed the chief article of exchange 
 
 Fig. 11. Axe Money (West Africa). 
 
 between the natives and the earliest European traders. In 
 other parts of the same region axes serve as currency; these 
 are too small to be really employeH as an implement, but are 
 doubtless the survival of a period not long past when real 
 axes served as money. Thus we get a complete analogy to 
 the hoe money of the Chinese and the fish-hook currency of 
 Ceylon and the Maldive Islands. In Calabar they formerly 
 employed bunches of quadrangular copper-wire as currency. 
 Each wire was about 12 inches long, and they were of course 
 meant to be made into necklets and armlets^ 
 
 In other parts of the West Coast, as in the Bonny River 
 territory, iron rings very closely resembling in shape the bronze 
 
 1 The speoimen figured was brought home about 30 years ago and is now in 
 the Edinburgh Museum of Science and Art. 
 
PRIMITIVE SYSTEMS OF CUKEENCY. 
 
 41 
 
 fibulae found in Ireland, which probably were armlets, are em- 
 ployed as money. Those which I have seen seem too small to 
 
 Fia. 12. Old Calabar copper-wire formerly used as money. 
 
 be used as bracelets, and are now probably a true money, re- 
 taining the old conventional shape (see Fig. 12)'. 
 
 In the region of the Upper Congo brass rods are employed 
 as currency for articles of small value. This wire, made at 
 Birmingham, about the thickness of ordinary stair-rod, is sent 
 out in coils of 60 lbs., and is then cut into pieces of a foot 
 
 ' The specimens here figured are in the splendid collection of my friend 
 Mr E. Day, of Cork. 
 
42 PRIMITIVE SYSTEMS OF CUERENCY. 
 
 long'. Short brass rods aad armlets are also largely exported 
 from Birmingham for the African trade. 
 
 Fig. 13. 
 
 1. Bronze Irish Fibula found in Co. Cork. 
 
 2. Bronze Irish Fibula found in King's Co. 
 
 3. Iron Manilla from W. Africa. 
 
 4. Iron Manilla used as money in Bonny River Territory. 
 
 There is no absolute standard length — and thus while 
 36 inches is the one most commonly used, the length varies 
 from 32 to 36 inches. 
 
 They go out in boxes containing 100, in straight lengths, 
 and soft to admit of their being wound into armlets, &c. 
 
 The diameter of the rod varies from ^ in. to about | in. — 
 but a rod weighing about 24 oz. to 3 ft., and f in. thick, is the 
 one most often made. 
 
 Arm rings are made from solid brass rod about ^ in. thick 
 and are usually 2^ in. to 3|- in. in diameter — they are also made 
 in large quantities from brass tubes of ^ in. to | in. diameter, 
 more frequently from ^ in., the rings being from 2J- in. to 3^ in. 
 in diameter, and weighing from 2^ to 4 oz. each 2- 
 
 Slaves and ivory tusks form the chief units in the same 
 region. The slave usually is worth a tusk. In other parts 
 
 1 This information I owe to Lieut. Troup. 
 
 " I am indebted to Messrs James Booth and Co. for this information. 
 
PRIMITIVE SYSTEMS OF CUKRENCY. 43 
 
 pieces of precious wood of a red colour, each piece being a 
 foot long, were employed as currency'. 
 
 When we come to regions where the ox can live we at once 
 find that animal occupying a foremost place. Thus when the 
 Cape of Good Hope was first colonized, the Hottentots em- 
 ployed cattle and bars of iron of a given size as currency^ and 
 at the present moment the cow is the regular unit among the 
 Zulus, ten cows being the ordinary price paid for a wife, 
 although as in Homeric Greece fancy prices are paid by the 
 chiefs for ladies of uncommon attractions. But our chief in- 
 terest must centre in the peoples north of the Equator, who 
 from time immemorial have been in contact with the ancient 
 civilization of the Mediterranean. 
 
 Thus among the Madis of Central Africa, a pure negro 
 tribe, cattle form the chief wealth; a rich man may have as 
 many as 200 head, a very poor one only 3 or 4. The average 
 number possessed by one man is from 30 to 40. They keep the 
 milk in gourds. 
 
 "A regular system of exchange is carried on in arrows, beads, 
 bead necklaces, teeth necklaces, brass rings for the neck and 
 arms, and bundles of small pieces of iron in flat, round, or oval 
 discs. All these different articles are given in exchange for 
 cattle, corn, salt, arrows, etc. The nearest approach to money 
 is seen in the flat, round pieces of iron which are of different 
 sizes, from three-quarters to two feet in diameter and half an 
 inch thick. They are much employed in exchange. This is 
 the form in which they are kept and used as money, but they 
 are intended to be divided into two, heated and made into 
 hoes. They are also fashioned into other implements, such as 
 knives, arrow-heads, etc. and into little bells hung round the 
 waist for ornament or round wandering cows' necks. Ready- 
 made hoes are not often used in barter. Iron as above-men- 
 tioned is preferred and is taken to the blacksmith to be 
 
 ^ Dapper Description de I'Afrique (Amsterdam, 1686) p. 367. " Le boia rouge 
 de Majumba et la, poo de Hiengo de Benguela tiennent aussi le lieu demonnaie: 
 on en coupe dea moroeaux d'un pied de long ; on leur met une oertaine taxe 
 Belon laquelle le prix des vivres se r^gle." 
 
 2 Peter Kolbeu, Present state of the Gape of Good Hope, p. 262. 
 
44 PRIMITIVB SYSTEMS OF CURRENCY. 
 
 fashioned according to the owner's requirements. Any tools 
 may be obtained ready made from a smith, and can be used in 
 barter when new. 
 
 "Compensation for killing a woman or any serious crime 
 must be paid for in cattle. No cowries are used as coins in 
 this district, no measure of weight, quantity or length is used. 
 The payment for a wife must be made in cows of a year old, or 
 in bulls of two or three years\" 
 
 But it is in Darfour and Wadai that we find the primitive 
 system in its fullest form. Wives are bought with cows, 20 
 of which with a male and female slave are the usual price of 
 a wife, hence the Darfouris prefer daughters to sons. Hence 
 the proverb that girls fill the stable, but boys empty it, which 
 recalls the cow-winning maidens of Homer {TrapOevoi aK(^ecri- 
 ^oiai). There is absolutely no metal of any kind in Darfour, 
 except that which is imported. Having no money, they accept 
 certain articles as having a certain monetary value. 
 
 Facher was the first place in Darfour which had anything 
 like a currency ; it consisted of rings made of tin, which were 
 employed in the purchase of every-day necessaries of life. 
 These rings are called tarneih in Darfouris. There are two 
 kinds, the heavy ring and the light ring ; the light serves for 
 buying the most trivial articles. For purchasing articles of 
 value they have the toukkiyeh, a piece of cotton cloth six 
 cubits long by one broad. There are two kinds of this 
 stuff, chykeh and katkdt. Four pieces of the former and 4i^ 
 pieces of the latter are worth a Spanish dollar. Buying and 
 selling is also carried on by means of slaves: thus one says, 
 " this horse is worth 2 or 3 seddcy (a name given to a negro 
 slave, who measures six spans from his ankle to the lower part 
 of his ear)''." A sedaciyeh is a female negro slave of the same 
 height. A seddcy is worth 30 toukkiyeh, or six blue chanter, 
 or 8 white chanter or six oxen, or 10 Spanish pillar dollars, the 
 only coined money known in Darfour, where it is called abou 
 
 1 E. W. Felkin, "Notes on the Madi or Morn Tribe of Central Africa,'' 
 Transactions of Royal Society of Edinburgh, Vol. xii. p. 303 seqq. 
 
 ^ Voyage au Darfour, Mohammed Ibn Omar el Tounsy (translated by 
 Perron), Paris, 1845, pp. 218, 815. 
 
PRIMITIVE SYSTEMS OF CURRENCY. 45 
 
 medfa, i.e. cannon piece, the pillars being taken for cannons. 
 The inhabitants of Kobeih employ beads for money, which 
 are called harich. They are green and blue and circulate in 
 strings of 100 each. This bead takes the place of the tin ring 
 {tarneih) used at Facher in the purchase of cheap commodities. 
 The harich as money is employed in numbers of from 5 to 
 100 beads (the string), from one string to ten and indefinitely 
 further\ 
 
 The toukkiyeh is worth in the markets mentioned 8 strings 
 of harich. Thus a seddcy is worth 240 strings. At Guerly 
 and its environments the falgo or stick of salt almost as big 
 as one's fi.nger is employed. This salt is obtained artificially, 
 and when liquid is poured into little moulds of baked clay. 
 This salt is sold by the falgo, not by weight, and one buys 
 by 1, 2 or 3 falgo according to the value of the article. 
 
 At Conca tobacco is used as money. At Kergo, Ryl, and 
 Chaigriyeh articles of moderate value are bought with hanks 
 of cotton thread. These threads are ten ells long, and there 
 are only 20 threads in each hank. For common articles raw 
 cotton with the pods attached is given ; it is not weighed but 
 simply estimated by guess. At Noumleh onions are employed 
 as money for common articles, and the ruhai or hank of thread, 
 and toukkiyeh for the more valuable, whilst the chanter and 
 dollar are unknown. 
 
 At Eas-el-Fyk^ the hoe Qiachdchah) serves as currency. It 
 is simply a plate of iron fitted with a socket. A handle is 
 fitted into this socket, and one has an implement suited for 
 chopping the weeds in the corn fields. Purchases of small value 
 are made with the hoe from 1 to 20 : above that amount the 
 toukkiyeh is employed and likewise the chanter. 
 
 At Temourkeh they use as moneys cylindrical pieces of 
 copper (called damleg) for articles of some value, whilst a kind 
 of glass bead called chaddour is used for small articles. Near 
 Ganz, the eastern part of Darfour, the principal article of 
 exchange is the doukha for articles of moderate value. They 
 give it by the handful, or by the double handful up to the 
 
 ' Voyage au Darfour, p. 316. 
 2 77.1^ T. aiQ 
 
 2 Ibid. p. 319. 
 
46 PRIMITIVE SYSTEMS OF CURRENCY. 
 
 amount of half a moda; whilst as elsewhere articles of value 
 are bought by the toukkiyeh or dollar. In a very great number 
 of places merchandise is exchanged against oxen; thus the 
 horse is worth 10 to 20 oxen. 
 
 Accordingly while each district of Darfour has some peculiar 
 form of currency for small change the higher currency is the 
 same everywhere, the piece of cloth, the ox, the slaved 
 
 In the region of Wadai the same shrewd Arab tells us that 
 cattle are kept by even the most barbarous tribes*. Thus the 
 Fertyt tribe, who go in a state of almost complete nudity, and 
 thus have no need of cloth, possess large herds of cattle, which 
 are not branded, but each owner distinguishes his cattle by 
 giving a peculiar shape to their horns as soon as they begin to 
 grow. In the less barbarous communities of Wadai slaves and 
 beads are employed as currency as well as cattle. The bead 
 used is called the mansous. It is of yellow amber and of 
 different sizes. Number 1 is so called because one string (con- 
 taining 100 beads) weighs one rotl (pound) of 12 ounces ; 
 Number 2 because two strings weigh a rotl; Number 3 
 because 3 strings make a rotl and so on. The first is the most 
 costly of all beads. Often a single bead of this sort (soumyt) is 
 worth two slaves ; if it is abundant each bead is worth a slave. 
 
 ' Voyage au Darfovr, p. 321. 
 
 ^ Voyage au OvMdai, Mohammed Ibu Omar el Tounsy (French translation by 
 Perron), p. 559. 
 
CHAPTER III. 
 
 THE DISTRIBUTION OF THE OX AND THE DISTRIBUTION OF GOLD. 
 
 And round about him lay on every side 
 
 Great heapes of gold that never could be spent, 
 
 Of which some were rude owre not purified 
 
 Of Muloiber's devouring element. 
 
 Some others were new driven and distent 
 
 Into great Ingowes and to wedges square, 
 
 Some in round plates with outen ornament. 
 
 But most were stampt and in their metal bare 
 
 The antique Shapes of Kings and Eesars straunge and rare. 
 
 Spenbeb, Faerie Queen, ii. vii. 
 
 Let us now take a general survey of the results of our 
 observations. First of all it is apparent that the doctrine of 
 a primal convention with regard to the use of any one par- 
 ticular article as a medium of exchange is just as false as the 
 old belief in an original convention at the first beginning of 
 Language or Law. Every medium of exchange either has an 
 actual marketable value, or represents something which either 
 has or formerly had such a value, just as a five-pound note 
 represents five sovereigns, and the piece of stamped walrus 
 skin formerly employed by Russians in Alaska in paying the 
 native trappers represented roubles or blankets^ 
 
 To employ once more the language of geology, we have 
 found evidence pointing to certain general laws of stratification. 
 In Further Asia we have found a section which presents us 
 with an almost complete series of strata, whilst in other places 
 where we have been only able to observe two or three layers, 
 
 ' Elliot's Alaska, p. 8. This is an interesting parallel to the ancient 
 tradition that the Carthaginians employed leather money. (Vide Smith's Diet, 
 of Geogr. i. 545.) 
 
48 THE DISTRIBUTION OF THE OX 
 
 we have nevertheless found that certain strata are invariably 
 found superimposed upon others, just as regularly as the coal 
 seams are found lying over the carboniferous limestone. As 
 soon as the primitive savage has conceived the idea of obtaining 
 some article which he desires but does not possess by giving in 
 exchange to its owner something which the latter desires, the 
 principle of money has been conceived. Shells or necklaces of 
 shells are found everywhere to be employed in the earliest 
 stages. When some men began to make weapons of superior 
 material, as for instance axes of jade instead of common stone, 
 such weapons naturally soon became media of exchange ; when 
 the ox and the sheep, the swine and the goat are tamed, 
 large additions are made to the circulating media of the more 
 advanced communities ; then come the metals ; the older orna- 
 ments of shells and implements of stone are replaced by those 
 of gold (and much later by silver) and by weapons of bronze as 
 in Asia and Europe, and by those of iron in Africa. Copper 
 and iron circulate either in the form of implements and weapons, 
 such as the axes of West Africa, the hoes of the early Chinese 
 and modem Bahnars, and the ancient Chinese knives, all of 
 which remind us of the axes and half-axes in Homer ; or in the 
 form of rings and bracelets, like the manillas of West Africa and 
 the ancient Irish fibulae ; or else in the form of plates or bars of 
 metal, ready to be employed for the manufacture of such articles, 
 as we saw in the case of the iron bars of Laos, the iron discs of 
 the Madis, and the brass rods of the Congo. Again we are re- 
 minded of the mass of pig-iron, which Achilles offered as a prize*. 
 It is of the highest importance to observe that such pieces 
 of copper and iron are not weighed, but are appraised by 
 measurement. We shall find that it is only at a period long 
 subsequent to the weighing of gold that the inferior metals 
 are estimated by weight. The custom of capturing wives 
 which prevails among the lowest savages is succeeded by the 
 custom of purchasing wives. The woman is only a chattel 
 on the same footing as the cow or the sheep, and she is 
 accordingly appraised in terms of the ordinary media of ex- 
 change employed in her community, whether it be in cows, 
 
 1 II. XXIII. 826. 
 
AND THE DISTRIBUTION OF GOLD. 49 
 
 horses, beads, skins or blankets. Presently male captives are 
 found useful both to tend flocks and, as in the East and in the 
 modern Soudan, to guard the harem. With the discovery of 
 gold, ornaments made at first out of the rough nuggets supersede 
 other ornaments, and presently either such ornaments or por- 
 tions of gold in plates or lumps are added to the list of media, 
 and the same follows with the discovery of silver. Such orna- 
 ments or pieces of gold and silver are estimated in terms of 
 cattle, and the standard unit of the bars or ingots naturally is 
 adjusted to the unit by which it is appraised. Thus we found 
 the Homeric talent, the silver bar of Annam, the Irish unga 
 all equated to the cow, and the Welsh libra, Anglo-Saxon libra, 
 similarly equated to the slave. With the discovery of the art 
 of weaving, cloths of a definite size everywhere become a 
 medium, as the silk cloth of ancient China, the woollen cloths 
 of the old Norsemen, the toukkiyeh of the Soudan, and the 
 blanket of North America. This fact once more recalls Homer 
 and makes us believe that the robes and blankets and coverlets 
 which Priam brought along with the talents of gold to be the 
 ransom of Hector's body all had a definite place in the Homeric 
 monetary system*. 
 
 We have seen the Siamese piece of twisted silver wire 
 passing into a coin of European style, and we shall find that the 
 Chinese bronze knife has finally ended by becoming a cash, just 
 as we have already found the Homeric talent of gold appearing, 
 in weight at least, as the gold stater of historical times. Thus 
 in every point the analogy between what we find in the 
 Homeric Poems and in modern barbarous communities seems 
 complete. We may therefore with some confidence assume that 
 we are at liberty to fill up the gaps in the strata of Greek 
 monetary history which lie between Homer and the beginning 
 of coined money on the analogy of the corresponding strata 
 in other regions. This assumption, resting on a broad basis of 
 induction and confirmed, as we shall see, by a good deal of 
 evidence special to Greece and Italy, will be found to explain 
 the origin, not only of weight standards in those countries, but 
 
 1 II. XXIV. 230—2. 
 
50 THE DISTRIBUTION OF THE OX 
 
 also of the Greek ohol and Roman as, as well as of the types on 
 the oldest coins, such as the cow's head of Samos, the tunny fish 
 of Olbia and Cyzicus, the axe of Tenedos, the tortoise of Aegina, 
 the shield of Boeotia, and the silphium of Gyrene. 
 
 Let us now turn to the races who both in modern and in 
 ancient times have dwelt around the basin of the Mediterranean 
 and Black Sea, whether in Asia Minor, Central Asia, Europe or 
 Africa. In what did their wealth consist ? When we first 
 meet in history the various branches of the Aryan, Semitic, and 
 Hamitic races, they are all alike possessed of flocks and herds. 
 To deal first with the Aryans; we have already had ample 
 evidence that such was the case with the early Greeks. The 
 ox plays a foremost part, and they likewise possessed sheep, 
 goats and swine, whilst slaves formed also an important com- 
 modity. Further east again, in the Zend-Avesta the cow is 
 found playing the principal part in every phase of the primitive 
 life there unfolded, both as the chief article of value and in 
 reference to their religious ceremonies. Still further to the east 
 we find from the Rig- Veda that among the ancient Hindus the 
 same important rSle was assigned to the cow. Turning now to 
 Mesopotamia we find that in the time of Abraham the keeping 
 of herds and flocks was the chief pursuit of the Semites. Passing 
 on to Egypt, the hoary mother of civilization, we find evidence 
 that although " every shepherd was an abomination to the Egyp- 
 tians,'' yet the worship of their great divinity Apis (Hapi) under 
 the form of a bull and the worship of the sacred ram indicate 
 that at a period preceding the invasion of the Hyksos the 
 Egyptians regarded the ox and the sheep with love and vene- 
 ration. Whether the Egyptians came from Asia into the valley 
 of the Nile, or whether they came from some region of Africa 
 more to the south, one thing at least is certain, and that is that 
 in either case they came from a country eminently fitted for the 
 rearing and keeping of cattle. The functions of the ox became 
 limited under altered conditions, and their ancient esteem for 
 the cow as one of their chief means of subsistence survived only 
 in religious observances. So too in modern India the reverence 
 for the sacred cow amongst a people who regard as an abomi- 
 nation the eating of beef is a survival from the time when in a 
 
AND THE DISTRIBUTION OF GOLD. 51 
 
 more northern clime cattle formed the principal wealth of their 
 forefathers. 
 
 In the Soudan, as we have seen to this day, slaves and oxen 
 are the chief kinds of property. Crossing back to Europe we 
 find the Italian tribes represented in the earliest records as a 
 cattle-keeping people. The story of their invasion of Italy took 
 the form of their driving before them a steer and following 
 obediently to whatever new home it might lead them'. 
 
 The same holds of the more northern peoples. When the 
 Gauls entered the plains of Northern Italy they drove before 
 them vast herds of cattle. Caesar found the Britons keeping 
 large numbers of cattle, and especially those in the interior of 
 the island subsisting almost entirely on their produce". Strabo 
 writing about A.D. 1, mentions hides as among the articles 
 exported from Britain to the Continents 
 
 The linguistic argument fully supports the literary evidence. 
 All the Aryan or Indo-European peoples possess a common 
 name for the cow. The Sanskrit gaus, Greek /SoO?, Lat. hos, 
 Irish ho, German huh, Eng. cow, taken together indicate that 
 before the dispersion of the various stocks (whether the original^ 
 home of the Aryans was in Northern Europe, as Latham 
 first suggested, or in the Hindu Kush, as Prof. Max Miiller 
 maintains) they all possessed the cow. This is further sup- 
 ported by the name for the bull which is found amongst 
 various stocks, the Greek Tavpo<s, Lat. taurus, Irish tarb, and 
 the name of the ox, which corresponds to the Sanskrit uksha, 
 and finally the name of steer*. Here then we have undoubted 
 evidence of the universal possession of cattle by the Aryans at 
 a. very early period. 
 
 Archaeology lends its support likewise. We have already 
 found in the case of the Greeks the cow used as a unit of 
 currency side by side with gold. This leads us to the question 
 of the precious metals, which in course of time have come to be 
 almost the sole medixim of exchange. In the case of the Greeks 
 we saw reason to believe that the barter-unit was older than 
 
 ' Timaeus 12. 
 
 ' 2 B. e. V. 12. s 199. 
 
 ■" Schrader. Prehistoric Antiquities of the Aryan Peoples, p. 260. 
 
 4—2 
 
52 THE DISTRIBUTION OF THE OX 
 
 the metallic. Is this the case universally? The evidence, I 
 think, which I shall adduce will lead us to this belief. 
 
 First of all it is certain that man must have been acquainted 
 with the ox long before he ever gathered a grain of gold from 
 the brook. When primaeval man first stood on the plains of 
 Europe and Asia vast herds of wild cattle met his eye on 
 every side. The process of domestication was long and slow, 
 but yet in all the ancient refuse heaps of Scandinavia and 
 Germany, whilst the remains of the ox are found in plenty 
 there is yet no trace of gold. 
 
 At this point it will be well to remind the reader that the 
 area occupied by the cattle-keeping races whom we have 
 enumerated was continuous. There was no insuperable barrier 
 between Indian and Persian, Persian and Mede, Mede and the 
 dweller in Mesopotamia, or again, between Persian and Arme- 
 nian, Armenian and the Scythian who lived in his ox-waggon 
 on the plains of what is now Southern Russia: the Scythian was 
 in contact with the tribes of the Balkan Peninsula, who in turn 
 were in contact with the Greeks and the dwellers along the 
 valley of the Danube, who in their turn joined hands with the 
 peoples of Italy, Helvetia and Gaul. Hence the value of cattle 
 would be more or less constant from one end of this entire 
 region to the other. The purchasing power of the cow might 
 be greater in some parts than in others, just as with ourselves 
 a sovereign has the same value from Land's End to John 
 o'Groats, although the purchasing power of the sovereign as 
 regards the necessaries of life may differ widely in different 
 places within the limits of Great Britain. 
 
 It is only when some impassable natural barrier intervenes 
 that there will be a difference in the value of the unit of barter. 
 Thus, in the case of Britain we cannot suppose that the 
 value of oxen was necessarily the same there as it was on 
 the Continent. If it was it would be merely a coincidence. 
 The difficulty of transporting live cattle in such ships as the 
 Gauls or Britons possessed would have been too great to permit 
 of such a free circulation of the unit as would have kept its 
 value exactly even on both sides of the Straits. In fact it was 
 only with the invention of steam that facilities for transmarine 
 
AND THE DISTRIBUTION OF GOLD. 53 
 
 cattle-trading came in which could tend to level the value on 
 both sides of an arm of the sea. In the earlier half of this 
 century cattle were extraordinarily cheap in Ireland in propor- 
 tion to the prices which they fetched in England, but yet the 
 difficulty and expense entailed in sending them across in 
 sailing ships effectually prevented the export. When the first 
 steamers began to convey cattle from Ireland to England the 
 profits were enormous, although the freight of a single cow cost, 
 I believe, several pounds. Steam-power has done much to 
 equalize prices, but still there is a considerable difference in 
 the value of cattle on both sides of the Irish Sea. But where 
 no impassable barrier of sea or forest intervened, we may fairly 
 assume the ox carried much the same value from Northern 
 India to the Atlantic Ocean. 
 
 We have already proved in the case of most of the peoples 
 with which we have to deal that the ox was the unit of value. 
 We have likewise found that these primitive peoples, whilst 
 employing a cow or ox of a certain age as their standard of 
 value, had adjusted accurately to this unit their other pos- 
 sessions : for instance, the heifer of the second year bore a 
 distinct value relatively to the cow of the third year, so like- 
 wise the calf of the first year and the milk of a cow for 
 a certain period. These thus acted as submultiples of the 
 standard unit, and as they were the same in kind and 
 only differed in degree, the various sub-units of the cow re- 
 mained in constant proportion to the chief unit and to one 
 another. On the other hand, when there was a distinction in 
 kind between animals, as between oxen and sheep, the relative 
 value would probably differ according to the scarcity or abun- 
 dance of either kind of animal, which difference would probably 
 arise from a difference in the nature of the pastures and 
 climate. Thus we have found in some places ten sheep 
 regarded as the equivalent of an ox, in others again eight. 
 The same holds good of goats. In the case of these smaller 
 animals we have seen the same fixed scale of values according 
 to age, and the same method of rating the value of the 
 milk of an ewe or the goat as we find in the case of 
 the cow. Amongst people who possessed horses, camels and 
 
54 THE DISTRIBUTION OF THE OX 
 
 asses, the same principle holds good, horses and camels on 
 account of their great value being treated as higher units for 
 occasional use, just as the elephant is regarded at present m 
 parts of Further India. The slave, as we have before remarked, 
 played an important part as a higher unit or multiple of the ox, 
 the average slave having a fixed value, whilst of course in the 
 case of female captives of unusual beauty a fancy price would 
 be paid. As climate and pasture would not aifect the keeping 
 of slaves, and as human beings were fairly universally spread 
 over the area of the ox, the probabilities are that it was almost 
 as easy proportionally to get slaves as oxen, and to keep the 
 one as to keep the other from being stolen. Thus there would 
 be more or less of a constant ratio between slaves and oxen. 
 There would be a tendency likewise to regulate the number of 
 slaves by the amount of work to be done, and as this work in 
 the pastoral stage is almost entirely that of the neatherd, the 
 shepherd, the swineherd and the goatherd, the number of 
 male slaves at least would be to a certain extent conditioned by 
 the extent of the flocks and herds. Such we may infer from 
 the picture of the household of Ulysses in the Odyssey was the 
 practice in early Greece. The faithful swineherd Eumaeus, 
 and his fellow the good neatherd, with the rascally goatherd 
 Melanthius, and their underlings, seem, with the addition 
 perhaps of a few house slaves who would assist in tilling the 
 chieftain's demesne (temeiios), to have comprised all the men- 
 servants. The master of the house worked hard himself in his 
 field and at various handicrafts, as we find Ulysses boasting of 
 his expertness both as a ploughman and mower ; he was 
 also a skilled carpenter, having with his own hands built 
 the chamber of Penelope and constructed a cunningly wrought 
 bedsteads Hence the amount of help to be required from 
 male slaves, exclusive of their duties as herdsmen, would be 
 but insignificant. When we come to deal with the question 
 of feinale slaves, the conditions of their number seem at first 
 sight entirely different. The question of polygamy here comes 
 in, and we must bear in mind that they were acquired not 
 merely as servants to perform menial duties, but likewise to be 
 ' Odyssey, xxiii. 198. 
 
AND THE BISTRIBUTION OF GOLD. 55 
 
 wives and concubines. It is evident then that the number of 
 such attendants will depend on the inclination and wealth of 
 the house-master. But here again the problem is simplified, 
 for inasmuch as his wealth consisted in cattle, a man's 
 power to purchase handmaidens depended on the amount of 
 his kine. Thus at the present day the number of women 
 owned by a Zulu depends entirely on the number of cattle he 
 possesses. Hence there was likely to be a fairly universal ratio 
 in value between female slaves and oxen, over such a region as we 
 have sketched above. The facility too in transporting human 
 chattels from one place to another would be an important ele- 
 ment in keeping the price almost the same over all parts of the 
 area. It is a very ancient principle with the slave captor and slave 
 dealer to sell their captives far away from their original home. 
 Among our Anglo-Saxon forefathers the slave from beyond the 
 sea was always worth more than a captive from close at hand'. 
 The explanation of this fact was suggested by Dr Cunningham, 
 and the proof of it was found by Mr Frazer in Further India ; 
 for there the slave brought from a great distance is always 
 more valuable than one who comes only a short way from his 
 native land, as the possibility of the former's running away and 
 succeeding in escaping is so much less than that of the latter. 
 This too seems to be the true explanation of the fact that ip 
 Homer we regularly find persons sold into slavery beyond the sea. 
 Achilles sold the son of Priam to Euneos the son of Jason of 
 Lesbos'*, the nurse Eurycleia had been brought from the main- 
 land, Eumaeus the swineherd had been sold to Laertes by the 
 Phoenicians who had captured him with his nurse in his distant 
 home". This constant tendency to sell in one country the captives 
 taken from another would do much to equalize prices every- 
 where, and the price being paid in oxen the ratio in value 
 between oxen and female as well as male slaves would tend to 
 be constant. 
 
 We have now reviewed the ordinary kinds of wealth amongst 
 primitive pastoral people, but we have touched but lightly as 
 yet on the subject of the metals. 
 
 1 Cunningham, Hist, of English Commerce, i. p. 117. 
 
 2 II. XXI. 41i 3 od. XV. 460. 
 
56 .THE DISTRIBUTION OF THE OX 
 
 We saw above that the two earliest kinds of currency 
 consisted either of some article of absolute necessity, such as 
 the skins of animals in the colder climates, or of some form of 
 personal ornament, which being both universally esteemed as 
 well as durable and portable will be readily accepted by all 
 members of the community. It is of pre-eminent importance 
 that it be universally esteemed. Travellers who have ignored 
 this principle have found out its truth to their cost in Central 
 Africa in modern times. As the chief currency consists of glass 
 and porcelain beads, which the traveller must carry with him 
 or starve, the European is too apt to assume that provided the 
 beads are bright and gaudy in colour all sorts will be taken 
 with like readiness by the natives. Sir Richard Burton in a 
 valuable appendix to his Lake Regions of Central Africa warns 
 travellers against this dangerous error. The African has his 
 own firmly rooted canons of aesthetics, and will take as pay- 
 ment only those sorts of beads which he considers suitable and 
 becoming. Again, some explorers brought supplies of cheap 
 Birmingham trinkets, thinking that they would captivate the 
 negro eye, but they proved a complete commercial failure, for 
 the natives much prefer trinkets and jewellery of their own 
 manufacture, and which are more in keeping with their standard 
 (jf good taste. Again, the Arabs of the Soudan will not take 
 gold as payment,- in consequence of which our army in the late 
 expedition had to take with them large and inconvenient 
 supplies of silver dollars, coined for the purpose. The Maria 
 Theresa dollar is the recognised currency in that region, not 
 because of any notions as regards currency properly speaking, 
 but because the Arab's taste lies in silver ornaments for him- 
 self, his weapons and his horse. He values then the silver 
 because of its utility as an ornament, whilst gold he cannot 
 employ to the same advantage. 
 
 I have thus digressed in order that it may be clearly seen 
 that mankind were not seized with the sacra fames auri from 
 the very first moment when the eye of some wild hunter or 
 nomad first lighted on a gold nugget as it glistened under the 
 sunlight in the stream. 
 
 A considerable period may have elapsed after mankind 
 
AND THE DISTBIBUTION OF GOLD. 57 
 
 became acquainted with gold or silver before man cast away 
 his necklets or bracelets of shells such as have been found 
 along with the most ancient remains of the human race yet 
 discovered in Europe, and put on his person in their stead 
 similar ornaments beaten out of the gold from the brook. It 
 is perfectly reasonable to assume that the primitive Aryan or 
 primitive Semite, who wore ornaments of shells, used these as 
 instruments of barter, or even currency, in the same way as 
 we have found the peoples of Asia and Africa using their strings 
 of cowries, the aborigines of North America their wampum 
 belts, and the Fijians their whales' teeth. 
 
 In what particular region mankind first employed the 
 precious metals to adorn his person, it is of course- impossible 
 for us to say. But beyond all doubt already in Egypt at the 
 very dawn of history gold was playing an important part. The 
 question of the relative dates at which the metals were first 
 employed by man is one of great interest and importance in 
 studying the history of human development. Of the four chief 
 metals, gold, silver, copper and iron, we have no difficulty in 
 deciding that iron is most certainly the latest to come into use. 
 It is only within historical time that implements and weapons 
 of iron have superseded those of copper and bronze, at least 
 within the area occupied by the great civilized races. The 
 reason for this is obvious: iron is not found native, but must 
 be obtained by a difficult process of smelting, and even when 
 obtained requires great skill to make it available for use. The 
 Greeks of the Homeric Poems were still in the later bronze age, 
 although iron was known and employed for weapons and imple- 
 ments. But as we have no immediate need to discuss the date 
 of the introduction of iron, we may pass on to the three remain- 
 ing metals. 
 
 It is obvious that if a metal is found naturally in such a 
 condition that it can be immediately wrought into various 
 forms for ornament or utility, such a metal is likely to have 
 been employed at a much earlier period than one which is 
 rarely if ever found in a native condition. Now silver is a 
 metal which is rarely found pure, and considerable metallurgical 
 skill is needed to render it fit for use. On the other hand gold 
 
58 THE DISTRIBUTION OF THE OX 
 
 and copper are both found in a pure state. We may then on 
 this ground alone infer that mankind was acquainted with gold 
 and copper before they as yet had learned the art of working 
 silver ore. It next comes to be a question of the priority of 
 gold or copper. The probabilities will undoubtedly be in favour 
 of that metal which is most universally found native, and which 
 is the most likely by its hue to attract the eye, and which is the 
 most easily worked. On all these counts gold can claim priority 
 over copper. Still copper is found native in various countries, 
 Hungary, Saxony, Sweden, Norway, Spain and Cornwall. 
 
 It is of course quite possible that in a region where gold is 
 not native and copper is, the latter may have been the first 
 metal known to the aboriginal inhabitants. This can be well 
 illustrated from the case of iron and copper in Central Africa. 
 The negroes never had a copper or bronze age, but passed 
 directly into the iron age, for the very sufficient reason that no 
 native copper was found in their country, and consequently 
 they had no metal suited for implements until they had learned 
 to smelt iron. Gold of course on the other hand was known to 
 them from the most remote period. Finally, from a famous 
 modern occurrence we may come to the general conclusion that 
 wherever gold is a natural product of the soil there it has been 
 the first metal to come under the observation of man. The 
 great gold-field of California was first discovered on a memor- 
 able Sunday morning, when the eye of a lounger who was 
 smoking his pipe by the side of Captain Sutter's millrace 
 happened to light on some glittering body in the sandy bottom 
 of the stream. This was the first scrap of gold found in Cali- 
 fornia, and whilst that fertile land has produced many natiiral 
 treasures besides gold within the scarcely more than forty years 
 which have since elapsed, its gold it will be observed was the 
 earliest of its metals, both from the nature of its deposit and 
 from the brilliancy of its colour, to attract the attention of man. 
 In certain parts of Southern Europe, notably parts of Southern 
 Italy and Southern Greece, where copper is found but not gold, 
 copper perhaps may have been known before gold, and certainly 
 before silver. It will be important to bear this in mind with 
 reference to a stage in our future arguments. 
 
AND THE DISTRIBUTION OF GOLD. 59 
 
 That silver came under men's notice at a later time than 
 either gold or copper can be put beyond doubt by historical 
 evidence. In the Rig Veda, where gold (heranya) is already 
 well known and likewise copper (for there can be no doubt 
 that the ayas of the Veda, Lat. aes, means copper), silver is 
 entirely unknown ; the word rayatam, which in later Sanskrit 
 means silver, does indeed occur, but only as an adjective 
 applied to a horse and meaning bright. Again, we know as 
 a matter of fact that it was only at a comparatively late 
 period that the famous silver mines of Laurium in Attica 
 were developed. At least Plutarch (Solon, oh. 16) tells us 
 that, owing to the scarcity of silver coin, Solon reduced the 
 amount of the fines levied and also of the rewards for killing 
 a wolf or wolf-cub, the former to five drachms, the latter to 
 one drachm, the rewards representing the value of a cow 
 and a sheep respectively. If they had already learned to work 
 that "well of silver, the treasure-house of their land," in the 
 time of Solon (596 B.C.), there certainly could have been no 
 such dearth of silver. Finally let us take a comparatively 
 modern case, that of the Aztecs of Mexico. When the Spanish 
 conquerors reckoned up their great tale of treasures found in 
 the royal palace, whilst the gold amounted to the large sum 
 of pesos de oro 162000 lbs., the silver and silver vessels only 
 weighed. the small sum of 500 marks^ Yet this was in the 
 country that is now known as the richest silver-producing 
 region that the world has ever seen. 
 
 We thus find a people in a highly advanced state of civi- 
 lization, who had invented a calendar, had devised a system of 
 picture-writing, who had actually a currency in gold-dust, as 
 we have found, and who were skilled and artistic craftsmen in 
 gold, and yet who were scarcely able to make the slightest use 
 of the silver, with which almost every crevice in their native 
 hills was charged. 
 
 We may thus with safety rest in the conclusion that silver 
 only comes into use at a stage always and probably much 
 later than gold. 
 
 We have been thus led to the conclusion that gold is 
 ^ Prescott, Mexico, p. 234. 
 
60 THE DISTRIBUTION OF THE OX 
 
 known to man at a far earlier stage than silver; furthermore 
 that copper is also prior in discovery and use to silver owing 
 to its natural form of deposit, and that, although in a region 
 where gold does not exist, copper may have been the first of 
 the metals to come under human notice, yet wherever gold- 
 bearing strata are found, there is a great probability that gold 
 was the first metal known. Schrader {op. cit. p. 174) has dis- 
 cussed the evidence from the Linguistic Palaeontological point 
 of view, and whilst much of what he says is interesting, there 
 are some points in his conclusions which shake one's faith in 
 the infallibility of the Linguistic method for determining dis- 
 puted points in archaeology. Gold he considers was known to 
 the Egyptians from the remotest times, and so also to the 
 Semites of Asia. As gold is found in abundance in the tombs 
 of Mycenae (circ. B.C. 1400) he considers that just about that 
 time the Greeks had acquired a knowledge of gold from the 
 Phoenicians. The Greek Ghrysos (xpva-o's), gold, is derived, 
 according to many scholars, from the Phoenician equivalent for 
 charutz, the Hebrew name for the same metal. 
 
 There is plainly no relationship between the Egyptian 
 name Nuh and the Semitic appellation. The question, how- 
 ever, may arise as to whether, even granting that chrysos is 
 derived from chdr'&z, it follows that the Greeks had no know- 
 ledge of gold prior to their contact with the Phoenicians. It 
 is the skilful manufacture of a metal into beautiful and useful 
 articles which gives it its real value. Hence arises the high 
 esteem in which the cunning workman is held in early times. 
 In Homer he is ranked along with the prophet, a sufficient 
 proof in itself of the great importance attached to his func- 
 tions. Again, in the Homeric Poems all articles of gold and 
 silver of especially fine workmanship, if they are not the 
 work of the divine smith Hephaestus himself, are the pro- 
 ductions of the Sidonian craftsmen. The priest Maron gave 
 Odysseus, amongst other presents, seven talents of well-wrought 
 gold. Whether this took the form simply of rings we cannot 
 tell, but plainly the value of the gift is enhanced by the 
 epithet. From these considerations it seems not unreason- 
 able to suppose that the Greeks, although possessing a name 
 
AND THE DISTRIBUTION OF GOLD. 61 
 
 of their own for gold, may have adopted a Phoenician name, 
 because they obtained the fine-wrought ornaments of that 
 metal which they prized so highly from the Semite traders. 
 
 If any one thinks that this is a mere suggestion unsup- 
 ported by analogy, my answer is not far to seek. The Albanian 
 word for gold is <f)Xjopi,^, so called because the first coined gold 
 moneys of the middle ages with which they became acquainted 
 were those of Florence. Now I think Dr Schrader will hardly 
 maintain that the Albanians were unacquainted with gold as 
 a metal until sometime in the mediaeval period they first 
 obtained it from the Florentines. What took place in the 
 case of the Albanians may have taken place again and again 
 at earlier periods. A rude nation already acquainted with a 
 certain metal receives by trade from a more advanced people 
 the same metal wrought into various shapes and forms for 
 personal decoration or use, and along with the superior articles 
 it takes over the name by which the makers of those objects of 
 metal described them. 
 
 These considerations well serve to show how unsafe is the 
 basis afforded by Linguistic Palaeontology alone on which to 
 build any theory of ethnical development. Let us now take 
 another case where Schrader and his followers dogmatize with- 
 out the slightest suspicion that' the facts of recorded history 
 may step in and rudely upset their conclusions. Schrader^ 
 holds that the Kelts were not acquainted with gold until 
 their invasion of Italy in the beginning of the 4th cent. B.C. 
 His argument is that the Celtic word for gold (Irish or, Cymric 
 awr) is a loan-word from the Latin aurum. As the Sabine 
 form of the latter is ausum, and the change of s to r did not 
 take place in Latin until the fifth century B.C., and as the 
 change of primitive s into r does not take place in the Keltic 
 languages, he infers that it was only after the change in the 
 form of the word had taken place in Latin that the Gauls 
 became acquainted with the metal. Yet who will, on reflec- 
 tion, maintain that the Gauls had not already learned the use 
 of gold from the Etruscans with whom they had been in con- 
 
 1 Schrader, p. 255. 
 
 '■^ Schrader, op. cit. p. 255. 
 
62 THE DISTRIBUTION OF THE OX 
 
 tact long before they ever reached the AUia or sacked Rome ? 
 The Italian dialects were still employing the form of the word 
 with s. Why should the Gauls have taken the form of the 
 word with which they must have come least in contact in 
 their invasion of Italy in preference to that used amongst 
 the other Italians ? Finally comes the irresistible evidence of 
 Polybius that when the Gauls invaded Italy their only posses- 
 sions consisted of their cattle and an abundance of gold orna- 
 ments, both of which could be easily transported from place to 
 place'. 
 
 Again, we can argue forcibly that it is contrary to all ex- 
 perience for primitive peoples to suddenly exhibit so strong a 
 predilection for metals, or objects of which they have not had 
 previous knowledge, as the Gauls showed in their rapacious 
 demands that the ransom of Rome should be in gold. The 
 legend that Brennus threw his sword into the scales, and 
 ordered them to make up its weight in addition to the stipu- 
 lated sum, shows, if it is true, that the Gauls were well ac- 
 quainted with the art of weighing, which would be only gained 
 from a long knowledge of the precious metals. The solution of 
 the difficulty involved in the Keltic or can be readily found. 
 The Iberians in Spain had long been skilled in the working 
 and use of the precious metals. Tradition told how Colaeus of 
 Samos, the first of the Greeks who ever sailed to Spain, brought 
 back a fabulous amount of precious metal, and that the Phoe- 
 nicians when they first traded in that region found silver so 
 plentiful that in their greed for gain, when the ship could hold 
 no more, they replaced their anchors by others made of that 
 metal. The Phocaeans had traded with Iberia and Gaul from 
 the end of the 7th century, Massalia had been founded by this 
 bold people about 600 B.C. Are we to suppose that in all 
 those centuries when the Kelts are in constant contact with 
 the Iberians, and when already all Keltike, Helvetia, Northern 
 Italy and even perhaps 'the remote Britanni,' were in con- 
 stant touch with the traders of Massalia, the Kelts waited to 
 learn the use of gold and silver until B.C. 400 ? The Basque 
 name for gold is urrea. It is quite possible that the Keltic 
 
 1 Polybius II. 19. 
 
AND THE DISTRIBUTION OF GOLD. 63 
 
 name was obtained from the Iberiaiis, whom they found abeady 
 in possession of Western Europe. But there is another alter- 
 native which is probably to be preferred. As we found the 
 Albanians calling gold by a name derived from the gold coins 
 of Florence, so the Kelts may have adopted the Latin names 
 for gold used by their Roman conquerors. This is made almost 
 certain by the fact that aura, in old Norse, derived from Latin 
 aurum, became the regular word for treasure, although no one 
 will deny that the Teutonic peoples had already gold and its 
 cognates as terms of their own for the metal. Everyone is 
 familiar with the influence exercised by the Roman coinage 
 even in the countries of the East, where Rome met with a 
 civilization hoary in age before Romulus founded Rome, and 
 from which Rome herself had ultimately derived the art of 
 coining. Yet by the time of Christ the Roman denarius, the 
 penny of our Authorized Version, had already asserted itself in 
 the Greek-speaking provinces of the East, and became in later 
 days, when the rule of Rome and Constantinople fell before the 
 Arab conquerors, under the form of dinar, the standard coin of 
 the great Mahomedan Empires. Did then in like fashion the 
 Roman form of the name for gold, which in all probability 
 varied but little from the cognate Gaulish word, supplant at a 
 comparatively early period that native form ? 
 
 The same argument may be urged in reference to the silver. 
 The Irish form is airgid, according to some a loan-word, being 
 simply the Latin argentum. We have already seen that it is 
 not possible that the Kelts, in constant contact with the Iberians 
 who were so rich in silver, could have remained in ignorance 
 of that metal. The Gaulish form of the name for silver was 
 plainly in Roman times almost the same as the Latin, as is 
 shown by Argentoratum, the ancient name of Strasburg. It is 
 plain then that before the Roman Conquest the Gauls had a 
 town called by the name for silver, whilst the Irish form has 
 no nasal, the Gaulish coincides completely with the Latin. Is 
 it not possible, that in this case too a native Keltic name, a 
 close cognate of Latin argentum, whose lineal descendant is seen 
 in the Irish form, may have been assimilated to the Latin form ? 
 But there is plenty of evidence from other quarters to show that 
 
64 THE DISTRIBUTION OF THE OX 
 
 the mere existence of a foreign name for a particular object m 
 any language is no proof that the object in question came into 
 use for the first time along with the borrowing of the name. 
 When the Franks conquered that portion of the Roman empire 
 to which they gave their name, they must have had Teutonic 
 words of their own for silver and gold, closely related to our 
 own forms of the words. Yet whilst many Teutonic words 
 lingered and became absorbed into what became in process of 
 time the French language, their names for the metals disap- 
 peared and the Latin derivatives remained in possession. 
 
 Again, we get another instance of such borrowing in the 
 case of our own penny, old English pendinga, penning, German 
 Pfennig. The philologists seem agreed in recognizing this as a 
 loan-word from the Latin pecunia. Yet money was familiar to 
 the northern peoples long before they ever came into contact 
 with even the advanced posts of the Empire. The use of rings 
 and spirals of gold as a form of currency in Scandinavia is well 
 known; our word shilling seems to mean no more than portions 
 of such a coil of gold or silver wire cut off, to be used as small 
 change. But as the first coined money with which they became 
 familiar was the currency of Rome, they seem to have taken 
 the generic Roman name for money as their own expression for 
 the Roman silver coins with which they became familiar, just 
 as the Latin aurum under the form of aura (eyrir) became in 
 old Norse the general term for coined money or treasure in 
 money. 
 
 We may ask why did the Kelts especially choose the 
 Roman form of the name for gold, if they were then for the 
 first time getting a name for the substance then (according to 
 Schrader) first known to them? Before they ever reached 
 Latium they had been in contact with peoples in Northern 
 Italy who undoubtedly were well acquainted with gold. The 
 Etruscans were a wealthy people, who coined gold pieces before 
 Rome had struck coins of any kind\ The Umbrians on the 
 east side, the ancient Italic race who had in the days before 
 the Etruscan Conquest held all Northern Italy up to the Alps, 
 which was hence known to the earliest Greek geographers by 
 1 W. Deeeke, Etrusk. Forschungen, p. 5. 
 
AND THE DISTRIBUTION OF GOLD. 65 
 
 the name of Ombrikd', were, beyond all doubt, acquainted 
 with the use of gold, and had a name for it probably the 
 same as the Sabine ausum. Why then did the Gauls re- 
 main entirely ignorant of gold and of a name for it when they 
 had been in constant contact with those peoples who had most 
 undoubtedly abundance of the metal and names of their 
 own for it? Until some sufficient answer is given to the 
 objections here raised, we must on every logical and scientific 
 ground refuse our assent to an argument, the sole basis of which 
 is philological. It may not be inappropriate also here to remark 
 that it is most desirable in all historical enquiries to rely as 
 little as possible on Etymology. From the days when the 
 Stoics laid such importance on arguments based on the origi- 
 natio verborum down to the present time reasonings based on 
 such foundations have been as a rule founded on the sand. 
 Comparative Grammar as yet can hardly be described as a 
 science. New principles and laws are brought to light each 
 year, and, although of course the solid residuum of what may 
 now be regarded as more or less positive knowledge is slowly 
 growing in bulk, those laws which were the shibboleth of 
 Philologists a decade ago, are now rudely hurled from their 
 preeminence. The only sound scientific method in historical 
 research is to employ linguistic science as merely ancillary to 
 our enquiries. 
 
 We have now seen the importance of the ox over the whole 
 area of Europe, Asia and Northern Africa, in which those 
 ancient peoples dwelt of whom history has preserved for us some 
 knowledge. We have likewise found that over the same area 
 gold was known and played an important part from a very 
 remote antiquity. This proof has depended of course almost 
 entirely on the literary remains and archaeological evidence. 
 Political Economists, when discoursing on the oft-vexed ques- 
 tion of monetary standards, lay down as one of the reasons why 
 gold has been found so convenient, that it is universally found. 
 Whether that fact is of much importance in modern times, 
 when the facilities of communication are so great, may perhaps 
 be doubted (especially when we see some of the largest stocks of 
 
 1 Herod, iv. 49. 
 E. 5 
 
66 THE DISTRIBUTION OF THE OX 
 
 gold existing in countries like England and France, where there 
 has been rio production of gold for many years), but most certainly 
 in early times it was of great importance, as we shall see, that 
 the supplies of gold were not all concentrated in one or two 
 places, but that at many points in all the different countries 
 which came within the area of the ancient world, nature had 
 had her treasure-houses. 
 
 To begin in the East, we shall first find that in all Central 
 Asia there are rich auriferous deposits in many places. The 
 stories told of the gold-digging ants and of the Griffins and 
 Arimaspians are familiar to all readers of Herodotus. That 
 historian (ill. 102 — 5) gives an explanation of how the Indians 
 are so rich in gold. To the north of India lies a region desert 
 and waste by reason of sand. Close to this desert dwells an 
 Indian tribe, who border on the city of Kaspaturos, and the 
 land of Paktuikd, dwelling to the north of the other Indians, 
 who live in the same manner as the Bactrians, and are the most 
 valiant of the Indians. These men go on expeditions in search 
 of gold. In this desert and in the sand are ants, which are in 
 size smaller than dogs, but larger than foxes. As these' ants 
 make their habitations under ground they carry up the sand 
 just as the ants in Greece do, and they are very like the latter 
 in form. But the sand which is carried up is of gold. The 
 Indians then make expeditions in quest of this sand, each man 
 having j^oked three camels. He then relates how the Indians 
 time their arrival at the ant region so as to reach the ant- 
 diggings at the hottest time of the day, which in that region is 
 the early morning. The ants are then not to be seen for they 
 have returned into their burrows to avoid the heat of the sun. 
 The Indians hastily fill the sacks they have brought with the 
 precious sand, and depart with all speed, as the ants from their 
 keen sense of smell quickly detect their presence, and at once 
 give chase. Their speed is such that though the camels are as 
 swift as horses, the Indians would never manage to return in 
 safety, unless they succeed in getting a good start whilst the 
 ants are still assembling from their various habitations. 
 
 This story has been very ingeniously explained in modern 
 times by Lassen (Alt-Ind. Lehen) and others. Lassen pointed 
 
AND THE DISTRIBUTION OF GOLD. 67 
 
 out that a kind of gold brought from a people of Northern 
 India was called pipilika 'ant' (Mahabhdrata 2, 1860) and that 
 it was probable that the story referred to a kind of marmot 
 which to this very day lives in large communities on the sandy 
 plateaus of Thibet. On the other hand more recent explorations 
 in Thibet show us that there are still communities of gold- 
 diggers, who in the rigour of the Himalayan winter clothe 
 themselves in skins and furs, which are drawn up right over 
 their ears in such a fashion that they present at first sight the 
 appearance of large shaggy dogs^. Whichever explanation may 
 be right, it may be inferred that from a very early time the 
 region north of the Panjab afforded vast supplies of gold. The 
 remark of Herodotus (iii. 105) that it was from this source that 
 the Indians obtained their wealth, and that there was not much 
 gold mined in their own land, is probably correct. It is beyond 
 all doubt that the gold of Thibet at all times found its way 
 largely into what is now the Panjab. We need have little 
 hesitation in believing that from a very remote epoch the rude 
 tribes of the Himalaya must have been acquainted with the 
 gold-dust, which lay in rich deposits in the various mountain 
 streams. 
 
 To come towards the west, the great wealth of the Persian 
 kings seems to have been derived from the basin of the Oxus, 
 which was famous in antiquity for its golden sands. Thus in 
 the Book of Marvels (a work ascribed to Aristotle and largely 
 composed of extracts from his writings) it is stated that the 
 river Oxus in Bactria carries down nuggets of gold many in 
 number ^ But the region from which Herodotus thought that 
 in his time came the greatest supply of gold was the Oural- 
 Altai region of Central Asia. The Greek Colonies on the 
 northern coast of the Black Sea, the most important of which 
 was Olbia at the mouth of the river Borysthenes, had a large 
 and lucrative trade with the Scythians, who inhabited the 
 wide plains of that bleak region. The Scythians were rich 
 in gold which they obtained from the still remoter country 
 
 ' Ausland, 1873, No. 39. 
 
 ^ Arist. Qav/i. 833 b. 14, ^a<rl Se h roir Bd/tr/jois rbv "flfoi* iroraiibv Kara- 
 tf)4p€iv ^laKla xpvffiou irX-Zidet iroWd. 
 
 5—2 
 
68 THE DISTRIBUTION OF THE OX 
 
 of the Issedones, that people who, though righteous in all 
 other respects, had the singular fashion of devouring their 
 dead fathers. The Issedones again obtained by barter the 
 gold from the Arimaspians, a race who had but one eye, and 
 were hardly human\ They in turn, so report went, obtained 
 the precious article not by traffic, but by theft from the gold- 
 guarding griffins, who occupied the land where the gold was 
 found. At least Herodotus says, "How the gold is produced 
 I cannot truly tell, but the story is that the Arimaspians, 
 people with one eye, cany it off from the Grypes^." He 
 describes elsewhere (iv. 17) this region, which lay beyond 
 the Scythians, where the cold was so great that the ground 
 was frozen hard for eight months of the year, and that it 
 was even cold in the summer season, that the air was so 
 full of feathers that no one could see, by which, as Herodotus 
 very properly explains, the thick falling feathery flakes of 
 snow were meant, and that the cattle could not grow horns. 
 All this seems to point beyond all doubt to the Ural and 
 Altai ranges. Unquestionably there was a well-established 
 trade route extending from the Black Sea through the country 
 inhabited by the Scythians proper, which Herodotus describes 
 as consisting of plains of rich soil, a true description of the 
 fertile steppes of Southern Eussia. Then beyond this lay a 
 large area of rugged, stony land, inhabited by a people called 
 Argippaei, who, males and females alike, were born bald. 
 Their territory formed the lower part of a range of lofty moun- 
 tains. They were a peaceful and a harmless race, dwelling in 
 tents of white felt in the winter. It was easy to learn about 
 them and their country from the Scythian traders who held 
 intercourse with them, as likewise from the Greeks from the 
 factories of the Borysthenes, and from the other Greek trading 
 ports on the Euxine. No man could say of a truth what lay to 
 the north of the " Baldheads," as on that side rose the lofty, 
 
 1 Herod, iv. 13. 
 
 2 Herod, iii. 116, Xfyeroi 5f viriK tuv ypvirav apw&^eiv ' Api/Mia-wovs avSpat 
 
 For the gold-fields of India, cf. Dr Valentine Ball's excellent chapter (iv.) in 
 his Geology of India. 
 
AND THE DISTRIBUTION OF GOLD. 69 
 
 impassable range of mountains, but Herodotus had heard (but 
 did not believe) that according to the " Baldheads " a race of 
 men having the feet of goats dwelt there', a legend which 
 may be plausibly rationalized into a simple statement that a 
 race of mountain- folk, sure-footed as the wild goat, inhabited 
 the mountains. But on their east the existence of the Issedones 
 was an established fact. 
 
 It is plain then that from a date lost in the distance of 
 time the gold of the Ural-Altaic region had been worked and 
 exported, and that consequently it was known and prized by all 
 the tribes who came within the influence of this wide district. 
 The Scythians in the fifth century before Christ were engaged in 
 regular trade with this region, and possessed abundant store of 
 the prized substance. This is shown by Herodotus in a very re- 
 markable passage wherein he describes the burial of a Scythian 
 king. After recounting the ceremonials he thus proceeds : " In 
 the open space round the body of the king they bury one of his 
 concubines, first killing her by strangling, and also his cup- 
 bearer, his cook, his groom, his lacquey, his messenger, some of 
 his horses, firstlings of all his other possessions and some 
 golden cups; for they use neither silver nor copper^" From 
 this passage we learn the interesting fact that the Scythians, 
 although possessing great quantities of gold and being able to 
 work it into articles of use, were yet ignorant of silver and 
 copper, which nevertheless, as we know now, exist in large 
 deposits in the Ural region. This is one of several cases 
 which we shall have to notice which go far to prove that the 
 knowledge and working of gold preceded not only that of silver, 
 but also that of copper. 
 
 The remoteness of the age at which some branch of the 
 Turko-Tartar family who dwelt in the Altai region, first dis- 
 covered the treasures which Nature had stored up there, is 
 evidenced, as Schrader (following Klaproth) rightly points out 
 (p. 253), by the fact that among all the branches of that wide- 
 spread family of languages, from the Osmanli Turks on the 
 Dardanelles to the remote Samoyedes on the banks of the 
 
 1 Herod, it. 25. 
 
 ' Herod, iv. 71, apyipif Si oidiv ovde xci^kv XP^'^'"'*'- 
 
70 THE DISTRIBUTION OF THE OX 
 
 Lena, the same word for gold is found in slightly varying forms, 
 altun, altyn, iltyn, etc., which can hardly be etymologically 
 separated from Altai, the locality from which it first became 
 kno^vn in far-off days. In the ancient graves of the Tschudi 
 in the Altaic districts, have been found abundance of gold 
 and silver utensils which according to Sjogren (Schrader 136), 
 exhibit the representation of the Griffin of Greek fable. 
 
 Before passing further west into Europe we shall complete 
 our survey of the gold-fields of Western Asia. One of the most 
 beautiful of Greek stories hangs around the eastern end of 
 the Black Sea, where lay the land of Colchis, the goal which 
 Jason and his fellow Argonauts sought in their quest of the 
 Golden Fleece. In the Homeric poems the voyage of the ship 
 Argo is referred to as an event which had taken place in a past 
 generation. In the time of the geographer Strabo(B.C. 63-A.D. 21) 
 gold was still found in Colchis in a district occupied by a tribe 
 called Soanes, scarcely less famous for their personal uncleanli- 
 ness than their neighbours the Phtheirophagoi (Lice-eaters) who 
 bore this appellation from the filthiness of their habits. " It is 
 said that in their country the mountain torrents bring down 
 gold, and that the barbarians catch it in troughs perforated with 
 holes, and in skins with the fleece left on, from which circum- 
 stance they say arose the fable of the Golden Fleece'." 
 
 Strabo's explanation, which seems from his v^ords to have 
 been the current one in his day, is extremely plausible, and 
 it appears highly probable that from the first dawn of history 
 the torrent-swept treasures of the Colchian land were well 
 known to the dwellers in both Asia Minor and Europe. But 
 this was not the only place in Asia Minor where gold was 
 found. We shall have occasion again and again to refer to the 
 Electrum of Sardis, obtained from the sand of the river 
 Pactolus which flowed down from Mount Tmolus. Scholars 
 are familiar with the account which Herodotus gives of these 
 gold deposits, but probably the most convenient thing for our 
 present purpose will be to quote Strabo's enumeration of the 
 
 ' Strabo, xi. p. 499, irapa toiJtois Si Xiyerai /coi XP""^" Karacpipew Toi/s 
 XeilJ.dppou5, iiroSSx^adai. S' airov rods pap^apous (parva-is KaTaTeTpijiiivais xal piaWta- 
 Tcus 5opais ' d(p' ou drj fji.ep,vdev(7&a,i Kal to xpvtyop^aWov Sepos. 
 
AND THE DISTRIBUTION OF GOLD. 71 
 
 kings and potentates of antiquity in Asia and Europe who were 
 famous for their wealth, as he has added in each case the 
 source from which their wealth was obtained. The current 
 account as given by Callisthenes and others was, "that the 
 wealth of Tantalus and the Pelopidae was derived from the 
 mines of Phrygia and Sipylus, whilst the wealth of Cadmus 
 came from the mines of Thrace and Mount Pangaeum, but that 
 of Priam from the gold-mines at Astyra in the vicinity of 
 Abydus, of which even now there are still scanty remnants. 
 But the quantity of earth cast up is vast, and the diggings are 
 proofs of the ancient mining operations. But the wealth of 
 Midas came from the mines round Mount Bermion, whilst that 
 of Gyges and Alyattes and Croesus came from the mines in 
 Lydia. But in the district between Atameus and Pergamus 
 there is a deserted city, with places containing worked-out 
 mines '." This passage gives a good picture of the gold-fields 
 which in ancient days were worked round the shores of the 
 Aegean. 
 
 In the time of Strabo some of them were already worked 
 out and gave but a scanty yield, for he says, "above the territory 
 of the people of Abydus lies in the Troad Astyra, which now 
 belongs to the people of Abydus, a ruined city, but aforetime it 
 was independent, possessing gold-mines, now affording but a 
 scanty yield, as they are exhausted, just like the mines on 
 Mount Tmolus in the neighbourhood of the Pactolus." The 
 latter district was still productive in the days of Herodotus, 
 who declared that the land of Lydia had few marvels to 
 chronicle except the gold-dust that is borne down from Tmolus". 
 Strabo too, elsewhere', when describing the river system of this 
 part of Asia Minor says, " the Pactolus flows from Tmolus, carry- 
 ing down that ancient gold-dust from which they say that the 
 famous wealth of Croesus and of his ancestors became renowned. 
 But now the gold-dust has failed, as has been stated." 
 
 It is interesting to observe that according to tradition the 
 wealth of Midas, the king of Phrygia, who is perhaps more 
 
 1 Strabo, xiv. p. 680. 
 
 2 Herod, i. 93, irdpe^ toO Ik toS TyniiXou Kara^epofiivov ^■qyiMToi. 
 " xin. p. 625 sg. 
 
72 THE DISTKIBUTION OF THE OX 
 
 famous for his ass's ears than his riches, came from the Bermion 
 Mount in that part of Macedonia, which was occupied in historical 
 times by the powerful tribe of the Bryges. This in itself is an 
 interesting indication of the intimate coimection and close com- 
 munication between the countries and peoples on both sides of 
 the Dardanelles from the earliest epoch. There were on either 
 side lands gifted by nature with stores of wealth, as well as 
 possessing the portals of either continent. Hence the Helles- 
 pont and Bosphorus have ever been the seat of rich cities, and 
 have ever been regarded amongst the greatest of prizes in the 
 struggles of the nations. 
 
 It is possible that the ancient legend connecting the wealth 
 of Priam of Troy with the mines of Astyra, still worked in 
 Strabo's days, may serve to explain the real cause of that 
 invasion of the Achaeans, which in all probability did occur, 
 although on what form or at what time we know not, and around 
 which there grew in the mouths of the rhapsodists the tale of 
 Troy Divine. In all our enumeration of gold-mines we do not 
 find a single one allotted to Greece Proper. The wealth of 
 Cadmus, the old Phoenician founder of Thebes, who was said to 
 have introduced the art of writing into Hellas, came, according 
 to Strabo's tradition, from Thrace and the mines of Pangaeum. 
 As Cadmus is the typical wealthy potentate of Northern Greece, 
 so the line of Pelops are the typical wealthy potentates of 
 Peloponnesus. Their wealth, like that of Cadmus, is adven- 
 titious, for it is the product of the mines of Phrygia and 
 Mount Sipylus. This is quite consistent with the statement of 
 Thucydides that "those Peloponnesians who have received the 
 clearest accounts by tradition from the men of former time 
 declare that Pelops first by means of the mass of wealth with 
 which he came from Asia to men who were poor, having ac- 
 quired for himself power although he was a new-comer, gave 
 occasion for the land to be called after him." 
 
 Of the three cities which are called rich in gold by Homer, 
 two are in Hellas proper, namely Mycenae in Peloponnesus, and 
 the Minyan Orchomenus in Boeotia. Gold has been found in 
 abundance in the prehistoric tombs at Mycenae, thus confirming 
 the ancient tradition. This gold, beyond doubt, was imported 
 
AND THE DISTRIBUTION OF GOLD. 73 
 
 from outside Greece, and we may without hesitation accept 
 the view of the Greeks themselves that it came from Asia 
 Minor. The story of the wealth of Cadmus, who came to 
 Boeotia as Pelops did to Peloponnesus is equally in harmony 
 with the Homeric tradition of a great wealthy city in Boeotia. 
 Dr Schliemann excavated the remains of Orchomenus, as he did 
 those of Mycenae, and of the ancient city at Hissarlik, but his 
 labours unfortunately gave no confirmation of the accounts of 
 the ancient wealth of Orchomenus. The reason probably was 
 that he came many centuries too late, as the great prehistoric 
 tomb known as the Treasure-house of the Minyans had long 
 since been repeatedly plundered and ransacked; not even one 
 bronze plate of those that once had probably lined its walls was 
 left. Still less likely was it that any vestige of gold would have 
 escaped the rapacity of the spoiler. 
 
 The wealth of Northern Greece, then, by the earliest tradition 
 is connected with the rich gold regions of Thrace, which, if we 
 accept the same tradition, must have been worked from the 
 remotest age. The connection of the Cadmus legend with this 
 region points clearly to very early Phoenician trade in the days 
 when as yet the Phoenicians had undisputed mastery over the 
 Aegean Sea and the Hellenes had not begun to develop mari- 
 time enterprize. 
 
 As a matter of fact the name of the island of Thasos, which 
 lay off the Thracian shore, was directly ascribed to a Phoenician 
 settler. In the time of Herodotus the Thasians had a large 
 revenue both from the mines on the mainland and from those 
 in their own island. For he tells us that " from the gold-mines 
 of Scapte Hyle they had a revenue on the average of eighty 
 talents, and from those in Thasos itself a lesser one, but yet so 
 good that the Thasians enjoyed exemption from taxation on 
 produce and had a yearly revenue from the mainland and the 
 mines together of two hundred talents on the average, but when 
 the. revenue was at its maximum, it was three hundred talents. 
 And I myself likewise saw these mines, and by far the most 
 wonderful were those which the Phoenicians who had colonized 
 the island along with Thasos had opened up, it was this Phoe- 
 nician leader Thasos who gave his name to the island. These 
 
'?4 THE DISTRIBUTION OF THE OX 
 
 Phoenician mines lie in the part of Thasos between the district 
 of Aenyra and Coenyra ; a great mountain has been upturned in 
 the search'." But the most famous mines on the mainland of 
 Thrace were those of Mount Pangaeum, Crenides, and Datum. 
 Strabo gives a succinct account of this wealthy district: 
 "There are other cities round the gulf of the Strymon, as 
 for instance Myrcinus, Argilus, Drabescus, Datum. The last- 
 named has very excellent and fruitful land and shipbuilding- 
 yards, and mines of gold, from which comes the proverb a 
 Datum of riches, just like loads of wealth." And in another 
 passage he says that, " there are very numerous gold-mines at 
 Crenides I The city of Philippi is now seated close to the 
 Pangaeum Mount. And the Pangaeum Mount too has mines of 
 gold and silver, and so has the region both on the other side of 
 and on this side the Strymon as far as Paeonia. And they say 
 likewise that those who plough the Paeonian land find some 
 morsels of gold." 
 
 It was in a struggle with a Thracian tribe, the Edonians, 
 for the possession of the mines at Datum that Sophanes, the 
 son of Eutychides of Decelea, who had distinguished himself 
 above all other Athenians at the battle of Plataea, was killed". 
 The possession of Thasos and the coaist of Thrace was not the 
 least important means by which Athens held her supremacy in 
 Greece, and when Philip (360 — 336 B.C.) finally got supreme 
 control over all this region, and built his new capital of Philippi, 
 his path of conquest was henceforward made easy by the golden 
 Philippi, the regale nomisma of Horace, 
 
 Dif&dit urbium 
 Portas uir Macedo, et subruit aemulos 
 Reges muneribus. 
 
 {Carm. III. 16. 13.) 
 
 Passing on now to Southern Asia we find that there gold 
 was found in Carmania (the modern Kerman) on the Persian 
 Gulf Strabo states on the authority of Onesicritus that in 
 Carmania a river carries down gold-dust, and that there is like- 
 wise a mine of dug gold and of silver and of copper^ 
 
 1 Herod, vi. 46 sg. " Strabo, 331. 
 
 3 Herod, ix. 75. •* Strabo, 618. 29. Didot. 
 
AND THE DISTRIBUTION OF GOLD. 75 
 
 That there was gold in Arabia is placed beyond doubt by 
 various notices in antiquity. " He shall live .and unto him shall 
 be given of the gold of Sheba (Saba')," says the Psalmist (Ps. 
 Ixxii. 13), showing that the inhabitants of Palestine regarded 
 that country as a source from which the gold-supply came. 
 
 Strabo and Diodorus give somewhat similar accounts of the 
 gold found along the Red Sea littoral. The former, describing 
 the land of the Nomads who live entirely by their camels, 
 which they employ for warfare and for travelling, and on whose 
 milk and flesh they subsist, says: "a river flows through 
 their land which carries down gold-dust, but they have not 
 skill to work it up. Now they are called Debae"; some of them 
 are nomads, others are tillers of the soil. But I do not mention 
 the numerous names of the tribes on account of their un- 
 certainty and outlandish pronunciation. Next to them come 
 more civilized men, who inhabit a more genial soil. For it 
 is well supplied with both river and rain water. And dug 
 gold is produced in their land, not from dust but from nuggets 
 of gold, which do not need much refining. The smallest 
 nuggets are of the size of olive-stones (?) {irvpriv), the medium- 
 sized are as big as medlars, and the largest are of the size of 
 chestnuts (?) (Kcipvov). Having perforated these they pass a 
 thread of flax through them in alternation with transparent 
 stones and make themselves chains, and put them round their 
 necks and wrists. And they offer their gold for sale to their 
 neighbours likewise at a cheap rate, giving thrice as much gold 
 as they get copper in exchange and twice as much gold as they 
 get silver in exchange, for they have not the skill to work the 
 gold, and the metals which they receive in exchange are rare in 
 their country and more necessary for life'." 
 
 This is a most interesting and important passage, as it 
 brings us face to face with primitive peoples in the very earliest 
 stage of the use of metals. The Nomads do not possess skill 
 
 1 Cf. Isaiah xlv. 14. 
 
 - The Debae of Agatharohides and Arteihidorus are held by almost all 
 scholars to be the people of Ptolemy's 0^|3ai ttAXis, i.e. Dhahabdn, from Dhahab, 
 gold, with term. -an. 
 
 3 Strabo, 661. 45. Didot. 
 
76 THE DISTRIBUTION OF THE OX 
 
 enough to work the gold-dust of their river, although evidently 
 aware of its existence. Their neighbours being more favoured 
 by the nature of their gold deposit are able to use the metal in 
 the way in which we may with safety conclude that mankind 
 everywhere first employed it. Accustomed to use ornaments of 
 shells made into rude beads, they had no difficulty in adapting 
 for like use the small lumps of native gold. They readily 
 pierced the soft metal and making the nuggets into beads used 
 them to form their necklets and armlets. But although this 
 people had made some progress in the working of gold, they 
 were incapable of working copper and silver. We shall have to 
 return to this passage hereafter. Let us now hear Diodorus in 
 reference to the same region. 
 
 He speaks of it in two separate places in his Collections, 
 first in his Second Book, when giving a brief general statement 
 of Arabia and its natural products, and again in the Third Book, 
 when he is giving a more detailed account of the tribes who 
 dwelt along the shores of the Red Sea or, as he called it, the 
 Arabian Gulf. 
 
 The first passage runs thus (he has just been describing 
 certain quarries) : " There are mines in Arabia likewise of the 
 gold that is termed ' fireless.' It is not refined down from gold- 
 dust as in other countries, but it is obtained straightway on 
 being dug up in size like unto chestnuts, and so fiery in colour 
 that the most precious stones when set in it by the craftsmen 
 make the most lovely of ornaments. And so great abundance 
 of all sorts of cattle is found iu the country that many tribes 
 having chosen a pastoral life are able to get a comfortable 
 subsistence, and being completely furnished with the plenteous- 
 ness derived from their herds, they even have no need of corn 
 in addition ^" In his second reference, after describing the hill 
 district, where lay the Mount Chabinus, densely clad with 
 forests of all kinds of trees he says : " The land which comes 
 next to the mountain region those Arabs called- Debae inhabit. 
 Now these people are camel-keepers and make use of this 
 animal for all the most important affairs in life. For from 
 them, they fight against their enemies and conveying their 
 
 1 Diodorus Sic. ii. 50. 1 sq. 
 
AND THE DISTRIBUTION OF GOLD. 77 
 
 wares on the backs of these effect successfully all their business, 
 and they subsist by drinking their milk, and they range over 
 the whole region on their fleet camels. Now about midway 
 in their land flows a river which brings down so much shining 
 gold-dust that the alluvial mud deposited at its mouth posi- 
 tively glitters. Now the natives are completely unskilled in the 
 working of the gold, but they are hospitable to strangers, not to 
 all comers, but to those alone who come from Boeotia' and 
 Peloponnesus because of a certain ancient affinity of Heracles 
 with their nation, a tradition of which in legendary fashion 
 they relate they have received from their forefathers. The 
 next region is settled by the Alilaean and Gasandan Arabs, not 
 being torrid, like those near it, inasmuch as it is often overcast 
 with soft dense clouds, and from these arise snowstorms and 
 seasonable rains which make the summer season temperate. 
 And the land is capable of producing everything and surpasses 
 in excellence, yet it does not meet with proper attention, owing 
 to the ignorance of the folk. And finding gold in the natural 
 cavities in the earth they collect it in quantities, not that which 
 is obtained by fusion from gold-dust, but that which is native 
 and from the circumstance called ' fireless.' And as to size the 
 smallest piece found is similar to an olive-stone, whilst the 
 largest is not much less than a walnut. And they wear it 
 round their wrists and necks when it is perforated, the nuggets 
 alternating with transparent stones. But since this kind of 
 metal is plentiful with them, but copper and iron are scarce, 
 they barter these wares with the traders at an equal rate^" 
 Strabo probably got his information from Artemidorus, who is 
 his chief authority for everything connected with the Red Sea. 
 Diodorus, whose authority is Agatharchides, substantially agrees 
 with Strabo in all the main facts, such as the name of the tribe 
 who cannot work up the gold-dust, whilst he adds the names of 
 the Alilaeans and Gasandans, which are not given by Strabo'. 
 
 ' This story about their connection with Boeotia doubtless arose from the 
 confusion between Aipai and 6^/3ai. 
 
 ' Diod. Sic. III. 45. 4. 
 
 " His description of the size of the largest nuggets of gold varies slightly ; 
 in his second reference he compares them to "royal nuts" {Kdpva paffi\iKd), which 
 
78 THE DISTRIBUTION OF THE OX 
 
 From Arabia we naturally pass on to Egypt. We have 
 already seen that the archaeologists assign reasons for sup- 
 posing that the Egyptians were acquainted with gold from the 
 remotest ages. The Egyptian word for gold is nub, from which 
 the name Nubia, i.e. El Dorado, is commonly derived. Having 
 fresh in our minds the interesting fact noticed above (p. 69) 
 that the universal word for gold in use amongst the Turko- 
 Tartaric races is probably derived from the Altai, the source 
 from which they first got the metal, we are tempted to reverse 
 the ordinary doctrine, and to derive the Egyptian name for 
 gold from that of the region whence they first obtained it. 
 The principle of naming products after the region or place 
 from which they have been first brought is too well known 
 to need illustration. Instances are familiar in all languages : 
 Cappadocae, the Latin name for lettuce ; Persica from which 
 has come our peach, through the French ; Indian com, india- 
 rubber, etc. are sufficient examples. The negroes of Eastern 
 Africa call a certain kind of cloth Merikano, i.e. American. 
 Perhaps, then, the name nuh is rather a word of this class, and 
 Nubia is not like Gold Coast, which belongs to the category 
 of names formed by epithets applied in consequence of some 
 article already well known having been found there. 
 
 Strabo (p. 821), describing Meroe, that large and fer- 
 tile island formed by the Nile, says: "the island has many 
 great mountains, and some of its inhabitants are shepherds, 
 some hunters, and some husbandmen. And there are likewise 
 copper-diggings and iron-works, and gold-mines, and varieties 
 of valuable marbles. It is shut off from Libya by great sands, 
 
 are generally admitted to be walnuts, though walnuts are sometimes also called 
 " Persian nuts " (K&pva XlepinKi), the latter name reminding us of the derivation 
 ot walnut itself; in the first passage he likens them in size to chestnuts (/cdpud 
 KoaravaLKi or /taiTToi/aia), the name being said to be derived from Castanaea, u 
 city of Pontus. It would seem from . this then that Diodorus got his accounts 
 from two slightly different sources. Strabo has been so cautious as not to 
 give us any specific epithet for the large nut, which we may accordingly regard 
 as we please either as a chestnut or a walnut. ThJere can be no doubt about 
 the fruit to which Strabo compares the medium- sized nuggets. The mespilon, 
 Latin mespilum (from which comes the French nefte), is undoubtedly the 
 medlar, whilst perhaps the most likely meaning for the smallest of the three 
 fruits is olive-stone. 
 
AND THE DISTRIBUTION OF GOLD. 79 
 
 from Arabia by unbroken heights, and from the upper region 
 from the south by the junctions of the rivers, Astaboras, Asta- 
 pus, and Astasobus. On the north the Nile flows all the way 
 to Egypt in that tortuous fashion which I have described." This 
 island virtually coincides with the modem province of Atbar. 
 It is probably to this same region that Diodorus refers in his 
 famous description of the Egyptian gold-mining. Although the 
 passage is one of considerable length, it is of such interest and 
 importance that it is perhaps advisable to give it in full: 
 " On the confines of Egypt, Arabia which marches with it, and 
 Ethiopia is a spot possessed of many great mines of gold, where 
 the gold is got together with much suffering and expense. 
 Since the earth is black and has lodes and veins of quartz of 
 surpassing whiteness, and which excel in brilliancy all those 
 natural objects which are noted for their lustre, those who are 
 in charge of the mining works by the numbers of the labourers 
 prepare the gold. For the kings of Egypt collect together and 
 consign to the gold-mines those who have been condemned for 
 crime, and who have been made captive in war, and further- 
 more those who have been ruined by false slanders, and who 
 owing to an outburst of anger have been cast into prison, some- 
 times only themselves, but sometimes likewise with all their 
 kindred, at one and the same time both exacting punishment 
 from those who have been condemned, and obtaining great 
 revenues by means of those who are engaged in the labour. 
 Those who have been consigned to the mines, being many in 
 number and all bound with fetters, toil at their tasks con- 
 tinuously both by day and all night long, getting no rest, and 
 jealously kept from all escape. For guards composed of foreign 
 soldiers, and who speak languages which differ from theirs, are 
 set over them, so that no one is able by association or any kindly 
 intercourse to corrupt any one of the warders. The hardest of 
 the earth which contains the gold they burn with a good deal 
 of fire, and make soft, and work it with their hands, but the 
 soft rock and that which can easily yield to stone chisels or iron 
 is worked down by thousands of hapless beings. And the crafts- 
 man who distinguishes the stone takes the lead in the whole 
 process, and he gives instructions to the workmen. And of 
 
80 THE DISTRIBUTION OF THE OX 
 
 those who have been appointed to this misery those who sur- 
 pass in bodily strength cut with iron pickaxes the glittering 
 rock, not by bringing skill to bear upon their tasks, but by mere 
 brute force, and they hew ovit galleries, not in a straight line, 
 but according to the vein of the glittering rock. They then 
 living in darkness owing to the bends and twists in the pits 
 carry about lamps fitted on their foreheads, and changing in 
 many ways the posture of their bodies according to the pecu- 
 liarity of the rock throw down on the floor the fragments that 
 are being hewn, and this they do unceasingly under the severity 
 and stripes of an overseer. But the boys who have not yet 
 reached manhood going in through the shafts into the exca- 
 vations in the rock, laboriously cast up the rock that is being 
 thrown down bit by bit, and convey it to the place outside the 
 mouth of the shaft into the light. But the men who are more 
 than thirty years old take a fixed measure of the quarried 
 stone, and pound it in stone mortars with iron pestles until 
 they reduce it to the size of a vetch. From these the women 
 and older men receive the stone now reduced to pieces the size 
 of a vetch, and as there is a considerable number of mills there 
 in a row, they cast the stone upon them, they stand beside 
 them at the handle in threes or twos, they grind until they 
 have reduced the measure given them to the fineness of 
 wheaten flour. And since they are all regardless of their 
 persons, and have not a garment to cover their nakedness, no 
 one who saw them could refrain from pitying the hapless 
 creatures owing to their excessive misery. For there is abso- 
 lutely no consideration nor relaxation for sick, or maimed, for 
 aged man, or weak woman, but all are forced to toil on at 
 their tasks until, worn out by their miseries, they die amid 
 their toils. Wherefore the unhappy beings regard the future 
 as more to be dreaded than the present owing to the excess of 
 punishment, and expect death as more to be longed for than 
 life. 
 
 "But finally the craftsmen get the ground-up stone, and 
 complete the process. For they rub the ground-up quartz on 
 a broad board placed on a slight incline, pouring water on it. 
 Then the earthy part of it, melting away by the action of the 
 
AND THE DISTRIBUTION OF GOLD. 81 
 
 liquid, flows down along the sloping board, but the part that 
 contains the gold adheres to the board owing to its weight. 
 Repeating this process frequently at first with their hands 
 they gently rub it, but after this pressing it lightly with deli- 
 cate sponges they take up by these means the soft and earthy 
 part until the gold-dust is left in a state of purity. 
 
 "Finally other craftsmen, taking over the collected gold 
 by measure and weight, put it into earthenware pots, and 
 in proportion to the amount they put in a piece of lead and 
 lumps of salt and furthermore a small quantity of tin, and 
 they add barley bran. Then having made a well-fitted cover 
 and having laboriously smeared it over with mud, they bake 
 it in kilns for five days and as many nights continuously. 
 Then after letting it cool, they find none of the other things 
 in the vessels, but get the gold in a pure state with but a 
 slight reduction in quantity. With so many and so great suf- 
 ferings is the production of gold at the frontiers of Egypt com- 
 pleted. For Nature herself makes it plain, I think, that gold is 
 produced with toil, is guarded with difficulty, is most eagerly 
 sought for, and is enjoyed with mixed pleasure and pain. The 
 discovery of these mines is of very ancient date, inasmuch as it 
 was made known by the ancient kings'." 
 
 Such then is the vivid picture drawn by the humane 
 Diodorus of the horrible torments of the unhappy bondsmen 
 who worked these famous mines, sufferings only to be pa- 
 ralleled by the miseries endured by the miners in Spain under 
 Roman rule, by the Indians in the mines of Peru under the 
 yoke of the Spaniard, and by the helpless sufferers under 
 Muscovite cruelty who at this hour endure a living death in 
 the mines of Siberia. 
 
 For our immediate purpose it is interesting to notice that 
 the Egyptians from a far back time obtained an abundant 
 supply of gold from the confines of their own territory, and 
 doubtless drew a further supply from those rich gold districts 
 along the Red Sea of which we have just spoken. 
 
 Whilst in the latter case we had a most instructive instance 
 of the first attempts to utilize the metals made by men, so in 
 ' Diodorus, iii. 12 — 14. 
 B. 6 
 
82 THE DISTRIBUTION OF THE OX 
 
 the case of Egypt we find an example of the most elaborate and 
 scientific process of gold-mining known to the ancients. For 
 we shall find that the process employed in Spain by the 
 Romans for refining the crude gold was not nearly so elaborate 
 as that employed by the Egyptians. 
 
 It is of course quite possible that supplies of gold either 
 in the form of dust or of rings may have reached Egypt from 
 the interior of Africa, but of that we have not as far as I am 
 aware any historical record. For the negroes who are depicted 
 in Egyptian paintings bringing tribute of gold rings might have 
 brought them from Nubia or from a region on the coast of the 
 Mediterranean further west. It is indeed a fact of great interest 
 that down to the present day gold in the shape of rings or links 
 is brought to Massowah on the Red Sea from Sennaar (Nubia). 
 This is the best of the three qualities which reach Massowah ; 
 the second quality is Abyssinian gold, "in grains or beads," and 
 the third is also Abyssinian gold " in ingots." Thus two most 
 ancient ways of using gold are employed in this region still, for 
 the gold in grains or beads reminds us at once of the story of 
 its being employed by the Debae to form necklaces^ 
 
 Once more let us advance westward, and notice the last gold- 
 field on the continent of Africa. That gold was obtained by the 
 Carthaginians from a district in North Africa is put beyond doubt 
 by a passage of Herodotus (iv. 195), who, after describing a certain 
 people called the Gyzantes, who coloured themselves red with 
 raddle, and ate apes, says that " the Carthaginians declare that 
 opposite this people lies an island named Cyraunis, two hundred 
 stades long (25 miles) but narrow in breadth, with a crossing from 
 the mainland ; the island is full of olives and vines, and there 
 is a lake in it from which the native maidens by means of birds' 
 feathers smeared with pitch take up gold dust out of the silt." 
 Whatever may be the exact spot meant on the coast of the 
 Libyan nomads we may at least conclude that there is a distinct 
 indication that the Carthaginians were well acquainted with 
 gold deposits in this quarter. Whether or not the Carthaginians 
 and in later times the Romans may have obtained by caravans 
 across the desert supplies of gold from the great gold-bearing 
 ' Mansfield Parkyns, Life in Abyssinia, Vol. i. p. 405 (London, 1853). 
 
AND THE DISTRIBUTION OF GOLD. 83 
 
 regions of West Africa, we have no means of judging, but it is 
 on the whole probable that they did. The voyage of Hanno, 
 the Carthaginian admiral, along, the western side of Africa can 
 hardly have failed to make known to them the existence of rich 
 gold fields, even if they had been previously ignorant of them ; 
 but it is still more likely that it was the knowledge of such an 
 Eldorado far away beyond the great Sahara that induced them 
 to send out the expedition. 
 
 It has often happened in the history of both ancient and 
 modern commerce that the products of a certain region are 
 known long before travellers or merchants from civilized lands 
 have ever reached the country that produces them. Thus the 
 merchants of Marseilles were probably familiar with the tin 
 brought from Devon and Cornwall across Gaul before the 
 famous Pytheas ever coasted round Spain and Gaul and visited 
 our shores. Again, in modem times, it is only within the last 
 thirty years that the source of that most familiar of drugs, 
 Turkey rhubarb, has been discovered. 
 
 By whatever means they may have learned its existence 
 the following passage of Herodotus (iv. 196) puts it beyond all 
 doubt that the Carthaginians in the fifth century B.C. traded 
 by sea for gold to the west coast of Africa, and that conse- 
 quently the savages of that region must have been long ac- 
 quainted with the metal: "The Carthaginians," he says, "also 
 relate the following: there is a country in Libya and a nation 
 beyond the Pillars of Heracles, which they are wont to visit, 
 where they no sooner arrive than forthwith they unlade their 
 wares, and having disposed them after an orderly fashion along 
 the beach, leave them and returning aboard their ships, raise a 
 great smoke. The natives, when they see the smoke, come 
 down to the shore, and laying out to view so much gold as they 
 think the worth of the wares, withdraw to a distance. The 
 Carthaginians upon this come ashore and look; if they think 
 the gold enough, they take it and go their way, but if it does 
 not seem to them sufficient, they go aboard once more and wait 
 patiently. Then the others approach and add to their gold, 
 till the Carthaginians are content. Neither party deals unfairly 
 with the other, for they themselves never touch the gold until 
 
 6—2 
 
84 THE DISTRIBUTION OF THE OX 
 
 it comes up to the worth of the goods, nor do the natives ever 
 carry off the goods till the gold is taken away ^" 
 
 Let us now retrace our steps to Europe and take up our 
 investigation at the point from which we diverged into Asia. 
 We found Thrace and Thasos to have been for many ages an 
 inexhaustible source of gold. We must now pass on from the 
 Balkan peninsula to the Italian. 
 
 Although according to Helbig {Die Italiker in der Poebene, 
 p. 21) no traces of gold have as yet been found in the lake-dwell- 
 ings of Northern Italy, which were erected and occupied by the 
 Umbrians, who occupied all that region until conquered by the 
 Etruscans '^j we cannot take this negative evidence as at all con- 
 clusive proof that the inhabitants of these dwellings were 
 utterly ignorant of gold and its use. Helbig has shown that 
 the inhabitants of the lake-dwellings were in the bronze age at 
 the time of the Etruscan conquest, which can be hardly placed 
 later than B.C. 1100. Bronze implements are found in the 
 remains. But as a matter of fact ornaments of gold are not 
 generally found in the ruins of the habitations of the living, 
 but rather in the tombs of the dead. That certainly has been 
 the case at Mycenae, at Spata, on Mount Hjrmettus in Attica, 
 in the island of Thera, and at lalysus in Rhodes. Contrast 
 the wealth of gold ornaments found in the tombs at Mycenae 
 with the complete absence of that metal in the palace at 
 Tiryns. Of course it may be urged on the other side that at 
 Hissarlik amid the ruins of a burnt city great treasure in gold 
 and silver has been found, and we must undoubtedly admit that 
 in certain cases such as that of a city suddenly destroyed by a 
 fire before there was time either for the owners to remove or the 
 enemy to pillage the valuables therein, there is the possibility of 
 finding such remains. If we were to apply this negative method 
 consistently we must conclude that Orchomenus, which Homer 
 called " rich in gold," was inhabited by men who were not yet 
 acquainted with that metal, and we should I believe be con- 
 strained to arrive at the same conclusion in the case of Nineveh 
 
 1 For similar ways of trading in Africa in modern times see Eawlinson's 
 note ad locum. 
 ■■f Herod, iv. 49. 
 
AND THE DISTRIBUTION OF GOLD. 85 
 
 and Babylon. At least Sir Henry Layard discovered scarcely 
 a fragment of any articles of gold in the course of his ex- 
 cavations on the site of those two cities, which nevertheless 
 we have the strongest grounds for believing were amongst the 
 wealthiest of those of ancient days. In dealing with the ques- 
 tion of Northern Italy we cannot separate it from the con- 
 tiguous region of Switzerland or Helvetia. Dr Keller, in his 
 well-knoAvn work on the Lake-dwellings (p. 459), gives instances 
 where gold has been found in lake-dwellings amongst remains 
 that indicated the owners to have been in the bronze period. 
 Of course it may be said and said with truth that the lake- 
 dwellings of Switzerland continued to be occupied down to a 
 time posterior to those found in the Aemilia. But when we find 
 that a gold ornament has been found in a dwelling of neolithic 
 age, we have a positive proof not simply of the knowledge, but 
 probably of the skill requisite to manufacture the metal. If 
 any upholder of the negative method urges that gold has been 
 found very sparingly in these lacustrine dwellings, let him 
 remember that the existence of one single object of gold in 
 these remains is sufficient to demolish all his argument. The 
 objects found in the lakes are chiefiy dt^bris, the offal of the 
 house, bones of animals, which had formed the food of the 
 former owners, broken and disused implements, and such like. 
 Ornaments of gold were not likely to have been fiung into the 
 bottom of the lake for the purpose of getting rid of them. Such 
 precious articles were probably handed down with great care 
 from generation to generation, and possibly in later days gold 
 that once graced the neck or arms of prehistoric men and 
 women has reappeared time after time in the form of coins, 
 first the rude imitations of the staters of Philip of Macedon, 
 again under the form of Roman aurei, and perhaps even 
 bore the impress of some mediaeval monarch at a later time. 
 There have been issues of coins both in ancient and modern 
 times of which not a single specimen is at present known ; 
 yet if any one were to argue from this against the truth 
 of the documentary evidence, the spade of a peasant by 
 turning up a single coin might on the moment wreck all 
 his logic. The sum of positive knowledge which we obtain 
 
86 THE DISTRIBUTION OF THE OX 
 
 from this discussion is therefore that some people who in- 
 habited Switzerland in what is called the neolithic age (a 
 vague and often misleading phrase) were acquainted with the 
 use of gold ornaments. Could we but fix the inferior limits of 
 this neolithic age, we should at least obtain an approximate 
 date before which gold was already known. But it is most 
 probable that stone, bronze and even iron long continued to be 
 used side by side in the same areas. The man who had no 
 articles to barter for bronze continued to use stone implements 
 of his own manufacture, whilst his more fortunate coeval used 
 weapons made of the superior but more costly material. 
 
 Granting now that bronze implements made their way 
 from the Mediterranean into the middle and north of Europe, 
 brought most likely by traders irom the more civilized shores 
 of the Aegean, let us ask ourselves how did the men of 
 the neolithic stage obtain them. Did the kindly Phoenician 
 trader generously bestow as free gifts these articles on the bar- 
 barians of the West ? Does the trader of today among the isles 
 of Melanesia lavish for mere thanks his wares upon the natives 
 who gather round him on the beach ? In Homer those Phoeni- 
 cian shipmen are described by an epithet, which by the mildest 
 interpretation means knaves. The men who brought bronze 
 got some valuable objects in exchange for it. Such objects 
 must be portable : slaves, gold, silver, copper, tin, skins and furs 
 would probably form the main objects of barter. If we make 
 use of the philological method of Schrader and his school, there 
 can be no doubt that copper was known to the Italians before 
 ever a Phoenician keel grated against their shores, for the 
 Latin aes is as we said a true Aryan word. There is no 
 suspicion of borrowing here from the Semitic as there is in the 
 case of the Greek chalkos. In such a case as this the philo- 
 logical argument has some distinct force ; for whilst, as I 
 argued, it is easy to realize a state of things under which a 
 native name for a particular substance already known may 
 give place to a foreign one, on the other hand it is difficult 
 to see how a people who are receiving such a substance for the 
 first time from foreigners, and who would therefore naturally 
 apply to it a term obtained from the foreigners' language, could 
 
AND THE DISTRIBUTION OF GOLD. 87 
 
 afterwards replace this name by one which is found applied to 
 the same substance by a cognate people dwelling thousands of 
 miles away from them. The Italians therefore probably had cop- 
 per from a very early age. But we have already seen good reason 
 for believing that a knowledge of gold precedes that of copper 
 whenever both are found in the same area. We saw that the 
 Scythians, who got copious store of gold from the Ural-Altai 
 region, made no use of copper in the fifth century before our 
 era, although copper is found abundantly in the same area. 
 From this we may infer with some probability that the Italian 
 stock were acquainted with gold sooner than with copper. We 
 may apply the same argument to gold in Italy as we did to 
 copper. Aurum (older ausum), the Latin word for gold, is 
 plainly not borrowed, as is perhaps the Greek chrysos, from the 
 Semites. Hence it cannot be maintained that it was only with 
 the Phoenicians that the knowledge of gold reached Italy. 
 
 It now only remains for us to see if the Italians had the 
 means within their reach of discovering gold. No one I suppose 
 will dispute that the Italian stock entered the peninsula from 
 the north, driving before them older occupants. They must 
 then have either entered Italy by the head of the Adriatic, 
 coming round from the valleys of the Balkan peninsula, or 
 through the Alpine passes. If they came from the first quarter 
 it is impossible to suppose that a people in close contact with 
 the tribes who occupied the Balkan peninsula, and who as 
 we have seen above must have been acquainted with gold 
 from a remote time, could have remained without a knowledge 
 of the metal. On the other hand it will be seen from the 
 following evidence that there was every opportunity for the 
 discovery of gold in the Alpine valleys. Strabo gives various 
 notices of the gold workings of this region. "Polybius states 
 that in his own day in the vicinity of Aquileia, in the territory 
 of the Taurisci of Noricum, was found a gold mine so productive 
 that on clearing away the surface dirt to a depth of two feet 
 gold which could be dug was straightway found, and that the pit 
 did not exceed fifteen feet, and that part of the gold was pure 
 on the spot, being the size of a bean or a lupin, only one-eighth 
 being lost in refining, whilst some of it required a process of 
 
88 THE DISTKIBUTION OF THE OX 
 
 smelting which, though more elaborate, was still very remune- 
 rative. . When the Italians worked them along with the bar- 
 barians for a Space of two months, straightway gold coin went 
 down one-third in value throughout the whole of Italy; but 
 when the Taurisci became aware of this they expelled their 
 partners and held the monopoly. But now all the gold mines 
 are in the hands of the Romans. And there too, just as in 
 Iberia, the rivers in addition to the dug gold produce gold dust, 
 but not in such quantities'." 
 
 In another passage, speaking of the town of Noreia in Nori- 
 cum, he says " this district possesses productive gold- washings 
 and iron- works'." 
 
 Moving on again westwards, we easily find strong evi- 
 dence of active gold-mining in the Alpine regions. All the 
 granite strata on the southern side of the High Alps from the 
 Simplon to Mont Blanc are auriferous. Not only have extensive 
 mining operations been carried on at different points down 
 almost to the present day, but the mines were beyond all doubt 
 vigorously worked, not merely in Roman but in pre-Roman 
 days. In the district of La Besse, at the foot of Mont Grand 
 on the right bank of the Cervo between Biella and Ivrea, are 
 still to be seen very extensive traces of gold washings and gold 
 diggings^. These are no other than the once famous mines of 
 Victumulae alluded to by Strabo when, in speaking of this 
 region, he says that "there is not now as much attention be- 
 stowed on the mines as there used to be, because the mines 
 in the country of the transalpine Kelts and in Spain are 
 more profitable, but formerly they were well worked, since at 
 Vercelli there was a gold-digging. Vercelli is a village near 
 Ictumulae which is itself a village, and both of them are in 
 the vicinity of Placentia*." So important were these mines that 
 Pliny ^ says there existed a Censorian law relating to them, by 
 
 1 Strabo, 173. 34—49, Didot. 2 i^id. 173 Didot. 
 
 "* Th. Mommsen {Nordetruskische Alfabete, p. 250, seqq.) gives an admirable 
 summary of the metallurgical history of this region. 
 
 * Strabo, 218. 
 
 ^ Pliny, xxxTii. 4. § 78, extat lex censoria Victumularum aurifodinae, qua in 
 Vercellensi agro cavebatur, ne plus quinque m hominum in opera pubHoaui 
 haberent. 
 
AND THE DISTRIBUTION OF GOLD. 89 
 
 which it was provided that the capitalists .who farmed the 
 mines were not to employ more than 5000 workmen. 
 
 There are also traces of ancient gold-washings on the 
 Cervo, on the Evenson, a small stream which comes down 
 from Monte Rosa, and which falls into the Doria at Bardo, 
 and likewise on the Doria itself from Bardo down to its junc- 
 tion with the Po. This latter region was anciently the territory 
 of the powerful and wealthy tribe of the Salassi. The traces I 
 speak of are beyond doubt the remains of the gold-workings 
 described by Strabo. " The territory of the Salassi contains gold 
 mines, which the Salassi, when aforetime they were strong, kept 
 possession of, just as they had likewise the control of the passes 
 (i.e. the Great and Little St Bernard). The river Durias 
 (Doria) gave them very great assistance in their gold washing, 
 and on this account dividing over many places the water into 
 many side-channels they used to empty completely the main 
 bed of the river. 
 
 "This was of service to them in their quest of gold, but 
 it did harm to the cultivators of the plains below, who were 
 being deprived of the means of irrigation, since the river was 
 not able to water their land from the others having possession 
 of the stream in its upper course. From this cause there 
 were incessant wars between the two peoples. But when the 
 Romans got the mastery the Salassi were expelled from the 
 gold-mines and from their territorj^, but still being in pos- 
 session of the mountain, they used to sell the water to the 
 farmers who had hired the gold-mines, and with whom there 
 were constant quarrels because of the grasping conduct of the 
 contractors'." This passage shows plainly that for a very long 
 period before the Roman Conquest the Salassi had not merely 
 worked the gold of their mountains, but had attained to very 
 considerable engineering skill in so doing. Further, in this 
 region have been found gold coins bearing the inscriptions 
 Prikou, etc. in one of the North Etruscan alphabets. These 
 coins were most probably struck by the Salassi, who were pro- 
 bably not Kelts, but a remnant of the ancient Rhaetian stock ^ 
 
 1 Strabo, 205. 
 
 " Th. Mommsen, i)ic nordetruskischen Alfabete, p. 223; Pauli, Altitalische 
 Forschungen, p. 6. 
 
90 THE DISTRIBUTION OF THE OX 
 
 Passing northwards by the Pennine Alps, the regular road 
 in ancient days from Italy into Switzerland, into the valley of 
 the Rhone, the so-called Vallis Poenina, the modern Canton of 
 Valais, we come to the Helvetii, whom Posidonius of Apamea, 
 the famous Stoic philosopher who travelled in Western Europe 
 about 100—90 B.C., describes as " wealthy in gold." This gold 
 was probably derived from the same Alpine region. The Hel- 
 vetii struck both silver coins in imitation of the silver coins of 
 Massalia with the Lion type, and gold ones after the type of 
 Philip's staters. We may now pass on to Gaul Proper, many 
 peoples of which were famous for their wealth, especially the 
 Arverni, who have left their name in Auvergne, and the Tec- 
 tosages, whose chief town was Tolosa (Toulouse). The former, 
 whose original home was on the upper waters of the Loire, 
 probably had no gold in their native mountains (for if they had, 
 Strabo would hardly have failed to mention it), but in the 
 second century B.C. they became the most powerful state of 
 Central and Southern Gaul, for " they extended their dominion 
 even as far as Narbo (Narbonne) and the borders of the terri- 
 tory of Massalia (Marseilles), and they likewise had the control 
 of all the tribes as far as the Pyrenees, and as far as the Ocean 
 and the Rhine. And it is said that Luerius, the father of 
 Bituitus, who fought against Maximus and Domitius (121 B.C.), 
 came to such a pitch of wealth and luxury that on one occasion, 
 making a display of his riches to his friends, he drove on a 
 waggon through a plain sowing broadcast gold and silver 
 coin, while his friends followed him gathering it up'." It 
 was the Arverni who first ^ struck gold coins in imitation 
 of the gold staters of Philip II., a fact explained by the 
 passage just quoted, which shows that their empire extended 
 up to the frontiers of the great Greek emporium of Massalia, 
 by which they would be brought into immediate contact with 
 all kinds of Greek currency; furthermore their conquests put 
 them in possession of those districts where we have direct 
 evidence of the existence of gold fields'. 
 
 1 Strabo, 191. '■' Hucher, VArt Gaulois, 19. 
 
 ^ We must then in all probability place the- first striking of the Gaulish 
 limitations of the Philippns about 150 B.C., rather than as is usually stated 
 about 250 b.c. 
 
AND THE DISTRIBUTION OF GOLD. 91 
 
 Again Strabo says: "The Tectosages adjoin the Pyrenees, 
 and to a slight extent they likewise touch upon the northern 
 side of the Cevennes (Ke/t/Ltez/a), and they occupy a land rich 
 in gold'." It is no doubt with reference to the same region 
 that Strabo, whilst describing the Spanish gold-mines, remarks 
 incidentally that "the Gauls advance the claims of the mines 
 in their country, both those in the Cevenne mountain and 
 at the foot of the Pyrenees, themselves"." Beyond doubt 
 from those mines came "the gold of Tolosa," those vast trea- 
 sures which were plundered by the Roman General Gaepio. 
 They were said to have amounted to fifteen thousand talents 
 of unwrought gold and silver. There was a current story 
 that, for laying sacrilegious hands on the consecrated treasure, 
 misfortune dogged the steps of Gaepio and his family, he him- 
 self dying in exile and his daughters, after lives of degradation, 
 coming to a shameful end. This was the account given by 
 one Timagenes, who also stated that the treasure of Toulouse 
 was part of the spoil taken by the Gauls from the temple of 
 Delphi in 279 B.C., the Tectosages as he alleged having formed 
 part of the invading host. This story doubtless is due to 
 the circumstance that one of the three tribes of Gauls who 
 settled in Asia Minor (the "foolish Galatians" of St Paul's 
 Epistle) was called by the same name as the Tectosages of Gaul 
 (the other two being called Trocmi and Tolistobogii). The 
 treasures were partly stored in shrines or sacred enclosures, 
 partly deposited in the sacred lakes. There can be little doubt 
 that Posidonius was right (as Strabo also thought) in considering 
 them ancient native offerings, not spoils of war. He put forward 
 the good argument that at the time of the attack on Delphi the 
 temple there was bare of treasure, as it had been plundered by 
 the Phocians in the Sacred War some seventy years before, that 
 any treasure that remained was distributed among many, and that 
 it was not likely that any of the Gauls returned to their own 
 land, since after their retreat from Greece they broke up and 
 were scattered into various regions. This is confirmed by what 
 Diodorus tells us in a remarkable chapter : " The Kelts of the 
 interior have a singular peculiarity with respect to the sacred 
 1 Strabo, 187. = Strabo, 146. 
 
92 THE DISTRIBUTIOK OF THE OX 
 
 enclosures of the gods. For in the temples and sacred en- 
 closures consecrated in their country gold is deposited in 
 quantities, and not one of the natives touches it owing to super- 
 stition, although the Kelts are excessively avaricious'." This 
 passage seems to explain thoroughly the real nature of the 
 treasures of Tolosa ; they were doubtless ancient votive offerings 
 under a taboo, not, as Timagenes imagined, some of the treasure 
 of Delphi, dedicated to appease the wrath of Apollo, with 
 additions from the private resources of the Tectosages them- 
 selves. In the same chapter Diodorus says that "there is no 
 silver at all found in Gaul, but gold in abundance, of which the 
 natives get supplied without mining or hardship. The currents 
 of the rivers, which are tortuous in their course, beat against 
 the banks formed by the adjacent mountains, and bursting away 
 considerable hills, fill them with gold dust. This the persons 
 who are engaged in the workings collect, and they grind or 
 break up the lumps which contain the gold dust. Then 
 having washed away the earthy part with water, they transfer 
 the gold to furnaces for smelting. In this fashion heaping up 
 quantities of gold, not only the women but likewise the men 
 employ it for adornment. For they wear bracelets round 
 their wrists and arms, and thick torques of solid gold round 
 their necks and rings of remarkable size, and moreover breast- 
 plates of gold." The statement regarding silver is not accu- 
 rate, as the more careful and trustworthy Strabo mentions 
 silver mines in various places in Gaul. Finally, in the land 
 of the Tarbelli, an Iberian tribe of Aquitania, who dwelt in 
 the extreme south-west corner of Aquitania on the shore of 
 the Bay of Biscay, there were extremely productive gold-mines. 
 " For in spots dug only to a shallow depth are found plates of 
 gold that sometimes require little refining, and the rest consists 
 of dust and nuggets which involve but little working'^." 
 
 I have purposely gone somewhat minutely into the gold- 
 fields of ancient Gaul, and the story of the sacred treasures. 
 For I think that no one who considers carefully the statements 
 of Posidonius, Strabo, and Diodorus, can help regarding as 
 wholly inaccurate the conclusion of Schrader, based on the Irish 
 1 Diodorus, y. 27. = Strabo, 190. 
 
AND THE DISTRIBUTION OF GOLD. 93 
 
 word or, that the Keltic peoples were not acquainted with gold 
 until the fourth century B.C. The sacred treasures point to 
 a ceremonial consecration of gold extending back through un- 
 told ages. 
 
 It must also be borne in mind that in the treasure of Tolosa 
 there was a good proportion of silver which probably came 
 from the silver mines mentioned by Strabo' as existing in the land 
 of the Ruteni and Gabales (Fa/SaXet?), two peoples of Aquitania, 
 whose names are represented by the modern Rovergue and 
 Gevaudan. As the working of silver is so much later than 
 that of gold, it is impossible to believe that if the Gauls in 
 Italy only learnt the use of gold in the 4th century B.C. we 
 should find consecrated treasures of silver, evidently of ancient 
 date, at Tolosa in the time of Servilius Caepio. It is also im- 
 portant to observe that it is among the Iberians of Aquitania, 
 not the Kelts, that we find silver mines being worked. The 
 former people were entirely free from Roman influence, and we 
 shall see shortly that there is the strongest evidence for believing 
 that the Iberians south of the Pyrenees were acquainted not 
 merely with gold but with silver, centuries before ever Brennus 
 stood in the Roman Forum. But before we cross the Pyrenees, 
 we shall conclude our survey of the ancient gold fields of 
 Europe in the north-west by glancing briefly at Britain. When 
 Julius Caesar invaded the island he found the natives using 
 
 B. 
 
 Ancient British Coins. 
 
 A. Coin of loeni. B. Common type with plain obverse''. 
 
 gold not simply as ornaments, but in the shape of coins, for he 
 says, "They have great numbers of cattle, they use for money 
 
 1 Strabo, 191. 
 
 2 Both are from coins in my own possession; A found near Mildenhall 
 (Suffolk) in 1884, of. Dr Evans, Ancient British Coins, PI. xxin. 4; B at Potton 
 in Bedfordshire, 1888 ; of. op. cit. PL B. 8. 
 
94) THE DISTRIBUTION OF THE OX 
 
 either bronze, or coins of gold, or rods of iron of a fixed 
 standard of weight. Tin is produced there in the inland, iron 
 in the coast districts, but the supply of the latter is scanty ; the 
 copper which they uSe is imported'." Caesar's statement is 
 fully confirmed by the existence of ancient British coins, chiefly 
 in gold and copper; although silver coins are likewise found, 
 they are for the most part imitations of the types of Eoman 
 denarii, whilst the gold are the descendants of the Philippus, 
 from which the Gauls got their chief gold type. All the 
 Britains did not employ coins, but only the Belgic tribes in the 
 south and east, who had crossed over at a comparatively late 
 period. About a century before our era a king of the Suessiones 
 (Soissons) by name Divitiacus ruled over all Northern France 
 and a large part of Britain". Coins similar in type and weight 
 are found on both sides of the Channel, indeed the French 
 numismatists claim them as struck in Gaul, whilst their English 
 brethren have maintained that they are of British origin. Those 
 found in Kent are regarded by Dr Evans, in his Coins of the 
 Ancient Britons, as the prototypes of the whole British series. 
 Hence we may infer that the Belgic invaders brought the 
 Philippus type of coin into Britain, as it is most probable that 
 the time when the same coins were in circulation on both sides 
 of the Straits of Dover corresponds with the period when 
 Divitiacus held sway on both sides of the sea^ Strabo sub- 
 stantiates Caesar's account ; " It (Britain) produces wheat and 
 cattle, and gold and silver and iron. These are exported from 
 it, also hides and slaves and good hunting dogs. But the 
 Kelts employ even for their wars these, and their own native 
 dogs*." 
 
 1 Caesar, B. G. v. 12, peeorum magnus numerus. XJtuutur aut aere aut 
 nummis aureis aut taleie ferreis ad oertum pondus examinatis pro nammo. 
 Naseitiir ibi plumbum album in mediterraneia regionibus, maritimis ferrum, 
 Bcd eius exigua est copia, aere utuntur importato. 
 
 2 Caesar, B. G. ii. 4. 
 
 3 W. Eidgeway, "The Greek Trade Boutes to Britain" (Folklore, March 
 1880, p. 23). 
 
 * Strabo, 199, leaves out tin here although he mentions it when quoting from 
 Posidonius. The reason is that after the tin-mines of Northern Spain had 
 been developed by Publius Crassus, Caesar's lieutenant, the British tin trade 
 
AND THE DISTRIBUTION OF GOLD. 96 
 
 There can therefore be no doubt that gold was found in 
 Britain although we are not told in what particular part. 
 Gold is still found in Wales and in several parts of Scotland, 
 although not in sufficient quantity to be worth working. Two 
 observations remain to be made on the statements of Caesar 
 and Strabo. Caesar tells us definitely that whilst they used 
 copper as money, they had to import that metal. He omits 
 all mention of silver, whilst Strabo, writing half-a-century 
 later, speaks of it as a British product. I have remarked 
 already that the silver coins of the Britons are all late, and 
 exhibit as a rule Roman influence. It would therefore seem as 
 if the working of silver had developed some time after Caesar's 
 invasions. Thus once more we have an instance of gold in full 
 use long before silver. But what is still more important, though 
 the Britons are in the bronze period and are actually using 
 copper money, they have to import that metal, although copper 
 is actually found native in Cornwall. It still remained un- 
 discovered in Strabo's time to judge by his silence, but as he 
 is equally silent about tin, which was known long before, we 
 cannot press the argument ex silentio. However, it is of great 
 importance to find a people who possess gold and copper in a 
 native state, already working the gold long before they have even 
 discovered the copper. This is completely in harmony with 
 what we have already seen in the case of the Scythians and 
 Arabs of the Red Sea coasts. At a later stage we shall have to 
 notice the rods or bars of iron used as currency by the Britons 
 in connection with a similar practice elsewhere. 
 
 The writers of the classical age have left us no information 
 respecting Ireland save that the people practised polyandry, 
 and ate each other \ Nevertheless there is abundant evidence 
 to show that there were large deposits of gold on the east side 
 of Ireland, in the Wicklow Mountains, and that the natives from 
 a very early period wrought it into ornaments of various kinds. 
 The vast quantity of gold ornaments to be seen in the Museum 
 of the Royal Irish Academy is a proof of its abundance. 
 
 We shall now return to Aquitania and the Bay of Biscay, 
 from which we digressed to Britain, and coming into Northern 
 1 Strabo, page 201. 
 
96 THE DISTRIBUTION OF THE OX 
 
 Spain enter that region which was to the Greek of the sixth 
 and fifth centuries B.C. what the Spanish Main was to the 
 Europeans of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. It 
 seems beyond doubt that when the Phoenicians first reached the 
 Spanish coasts the natives were fully acquainted with both gold 
 and silver. Tradition told how the Phoenicians found the na- 
 tive Iberians feeding their horses from mangers made of silver, 
 and that after having filled every available portion of their 
 ship with freight of treasure, they replaced their anchors by 
 others made of silver. Colaeus of Samos in the eighth cen- 
 tury B.C. had been the first of all Greeks to reach Tartessus, 
 the Tarshish of Holy writ, having been carried away by a storm 
 when on a voyage to Egypt, and driven right through the 
 Straits of Gibraltar, "under some guiding providence," says 
 Herodotus': "for this trading town was in those days a virgin 
 port " (i.e. unfrequented by merchants). " The Samians in con- 
 sequence made a profit by their return freight, a profit greater 
 than any Greeks had ever made before, except Sostratus, son 
 of Laodamas, of Egina, with whom no one else can compare." 
 From the tenth part of their gains, amounting to six talents, 
 the Samians made a brazen vessel. At a later period the 
 Phocaeans made great profit by trade with Iberia, which at 
 that time meant East Spain as opposed to Tartessus, as well as 
 with the Tartessians. The king of this people, by name 
 Arganthonius, who reigned over them for eighty years, and 
 attained to the patriarchal age of one hundred and twenty, 
 became such a Mend of the Phocaeans that he invited them 
 to settle in his land, perhaps through motives of policy, wishing 
 to have their support against the Phoenicians of Gadeira, or 
 Gades (Cadiz), the most ancient of all the daughter cities of 
 Tyre. When he did not succeed in persuading the Phocaeans, 
 afterwards having learned from them of the great growth of the 
 power of the Medes, he gave them treasure to enable them to 
 fortify their city with the strong wall by means of which they 
 were to withstand Harpagus, the general of Cyrus, until they 
 launched their ships, and embarked their wives and children, 
 
 1 IV. 151. 
 
AND THE DISTRIBUTION OF GOLD. 97 
 
 with that firm resolution to be free, which has made their name 
 memorable through the ages'. 
 
 The evidence of these passages is sufficient to show that 
 already in the seventh century B.C., not simply the gold, but 
 likewise the silver, of the Spanish peninsula was known to and 
 wrought by the Iberians, the oldest race of whom written 
 history affords any traces in the west of Europe. 
 
 We shall now deal with the actual localities and mines 
 described for us by the ancient writers. Strabo once more is 
 our chief helper: he seems as usual for all statements about the 
 mines of the west to have drawn his information chiefly from 
 Posidonius, although he likewise makes use of Polybius and 
 others. " Posidonius averred that in the country of the Artabri, 
 who are the most remote people in Lusitania towards the north 
 and west [occupying the present province of Galicia], the earth 
 crops out in silver, tin and white gold (for the gold is mixed with 
 silver), and that the rivers carry down this earth, and that the 
 women scrape it up with hoes and wash it in sieves into a box^" 
 Here we have a description of the method employed by the 
 natives in the remote regions of the north-west of Spain about 
 100 B.C., before Roman influences had time to affect them, and 
 we may not unreasonably infer from it that the same process 
 was universal amongst the Iberians and Celtiberians of Spain. 
 
 In his general description of Spain Strabo declares that 
 nowhere in the world down to his day was such plenty of 
 gold, silver, copper and iron to be found as in Turdetania, the 
 district named after the Turdetani, one of the two great tribes 
 into which the Turti were divided [from the name of Turti it is 
 probable that Tartessus, the Greek name for this region, as 
 also for the Baetis (Guadalquivir), and also the Phoenician 
 Tarshish were formed]. " Not merely is the gold got by mining 
 but it is swept up. The rivers and torrents carry down the 
 golden sand, which in many localities is likewise to be found in 
 places where there is no water, but there it is invisible, but 
 in those that water flows over the gold dust gleams out. 
 And flushing with water that has to be fetched the arid spots, 
 they make the gold dust glitter, and by digging wells and by 
 1 Herodotus, x. 163—4. = Strabo, 147. 
 
 R. 7 
 
98 THE DISTRIBUTION OF THE OX 
 
 devising other means they get out the gold by washing the 
 sand, and what are called gold-washings are now more numerous 
 than the gold diggings. But they say that in the gold dust 
 are found nuggets sometimes even half a pound in weight 
 (/SoiXou? rifj.iXirpi,aia<;) which they term palae, which need but 
 little refining, and they say likewise that when stones are split 
 little nuggets like teats are discovered, and when the gold is 
 refined and purified with a kind of earth which contains alum 
 and vitriol, the residuum is electrum. When this residuum, 
 which consists of a mixture of gold and silver, is again refined, . 
 the silver is burnt away and the gold remains. But the gold is 
 very fusible, and on this account it is melted with chaff rather 
 than with coal, because the flame being gentle acts moderately 
 upon a metal which is yielding and easily fused, whereas the 
 charcoal causes excessive waste by melting it too much by its 
 violence, and detracting from it. In the river-beds the sand 
 is swept up and then washed in troughs beside the river; or 
 else a well is dug, and the earth that is brought up out of it is 
 washed. They make the furnaces for the silver high, that the 
 smoke from the ore may be carried up into the air: for it is 
 noisome and pestilential'." Then he adds that "some of the 
 copper works are called gold mines, from which people infer 
 that gold was formerly dug from them. Posidonius, when prais- 
 ing the number and excellence of the mines, refrains from none 
 of his wonted rhetoric, but warms up with hyperboles, for he 
 says he cannot doubt the truth of the story that once on a 
 time when the woods caught fire, the earth having been melted, 
 inasmuch as it was permeated with silver and gold, boiled out 
 on to the surface over the whole mountain, and that a whole 
 hill was a mass of money heaped up by the bounteous hand of 
 fortune. And to speak generally (he says) any one who saw 
 these regions would say that they were Nature's perennial store 
 chambers or Sovereignty's inexhaustible treasure house. For 
 not merely the surface but the under-soil is rich {irKovaia — 
 vTTOTrXoiiTo?), and with those people it is not Hades who dwells 
 in the region beneath the earth, but Pluto (UXovtcov). So 
 spake he in a fine figure as though he himself too were drawing 
 
 1 Strabo, 146. 
 
AND THE DISTRIBUTION OF GOLD. 99 
 
 from a mine his diction in copious store. There was a saying 
 of Phalereus in reference to the eagerness of the miners of 
 Laurium in Attica, that they dug as continuously and earnestly 
 as if they expected to drag up Pluto himself. This saying Posi- 
 donius quotes anent the energy and vigour of those who worked 
 the Spanish mines, for they cut deep and winding galleries, and 
 by means of 'Egyptian pumps' combated the springs which 
 burst into the workings \" 
 
 So rich were the silver mines of New Carthage {Cartagena) 
 that in the time of Polybius (140 B.C.) 40,000 men were 
 employed in working them for the Eoman State, and the daily 
 out-put was reckoned at 25,000 drachms, or roughly speaking 
 about 3,000 ounces Troy. 
 
 Diodorus Siculus" gives an account of mines and mining in 
 Spain, which, as it is clearly derived from the same passage of 
 Posidonius as the account of Strabo, is worth quoting, especially 
 as it gives probably in extenso what Strabo has summarized. 
 For although it more particularly refers to the discovery of 
 silver mines, yet it is very relevant to our subject, since silver 
 invariably is later in point of discovery than gold ; thus if we 
 can fix at an early period an inferior limit for the knowledge of 
 silver in Spain, we may with confidence fix the inferior limit for 
 the knowledge of gold at a still earlier epoch. Diodorus has 
 been describing the range of the Pyrenees, which like all the 
 early geographers he represents as running north and south, 
 and thus proceeds : " Since there are on them (the Pyrenees) 
 many forests dense with trees, they say that in ancient times 
 the whole mountain region was completely burned by some 
 shepherds having cast away a firebrand. Then since the fire 
 kept burning on for many days continuously, the surface of the 
 earth was burned and the mountains from the circumstance 
 were called Pyrenaean (Hvprjvala, scorched), and the surface of 
 the burnt region flowed with much silver, and since the natural 
 ore had been smelted, there ensued many lava-like streams of 
 pure silver. But inasmuch as the natives did not understand 
 the use of it, the Phoenicians trading with them, and having 
 learned about the occurrence, bought the silver for some small 
 1 Strabo, 146 sq. ^ Diodorus, v. 35. 
 
 7—2 
 
100 THE DISTRIBUTION OF THE OX 
 
 return in other wares ; accordingly the Phoenicians by convey- 
 ing it to Greece and to Asia and all the rest of the world 
 acquired great wealth. And so covetous were the merchants 
 that though their ships were fully freighted, when much silver 
 still remained over they cut out the lead that was in their 
 anchors and replaced it with silver. The Phoenicians by means 
 of such trade increased greatly and sent out many colonies, 
 some to Sicily and the adjacent islands, others to Libya, others 
 again to Sardinia and Spain. But many years afterwards the 
 Spaniards, having become acquainted with the peculiarities of 
 silver, started remarkable mines. Wherefore as they prepared 
 very excellent silver in very great quantities they used to get 
 great revenues." Diodorus then gives a detailed account of the 
 working of the shafts and winding galleries which followed the 
 course of the veins of gold and silver, the difficulties caused 
 by the bursting in of springs and subterranean streams, and 
 the ways in which the miners overcame this latter obstruction 
 by means of the Egyptian pumps. But Diodorus, as a patriotic 
 Sicilian, takes care to tell his reader that this pump was in- 
 vented by Archimedes, the famous mathematician of Syracuse, 
 when, in the course of his travels, he paid a visit to Egypt. 
 Finally, he gives a short but graphic picture of the sufferings 
 of the wretched slaves who were bought wholesale by the mine 
 owners and endured incredible miseries until death, the only 
 friend they had to look to, came to end their sufferings. Strabo, 
 the stoic, is silent on this point, which here, as in Egypt, so 
 strongly moved the heart of Diodorus. 
 
 The storj'- of the discovery of silver by the burning of the 
 woods at first savours of the mythical, but there is really good 
 reason for believing that there is in it a solid nucleus of truth. 
 Tin was unknown in Sumatra until in 1710' it was discovered 
 by the accidental burning down of a house (an incident which 
 recalls Charles Lamb's delightful account of the discovery of 
 Eoast Pig). It is highly probable that it was owing to some 
 such accident that men first became acquainted with silver, as 
 that metal is rarely if ever found native. It may well be there- 
 fore that mankind has learned the art of smelting metalliferous 
 
 ^ Marsden's History of Sumatra, p. 172. 
 
AND THE DISTRIBUTION OF GOLD. 101 
 
 ore from observing the results of some such conflagration as 
 that described by Posidonius. 
 
 Finally, we shall turn to Pliny the Elder for a moment. 
 That industrious collector has given us a minute account of the 
 various methods of mining carried on in Spain in his time, but 
 as that is beside our present purpose I shall only quote a short 
 passage, in which we get some interesting technical expressions 
 relating to gold-mining. After detailing the method of washing 
 soil containing gold by bringing streams of water to bear on it, 
 just as we found the Salassi doing in the valley of the Doria, by 
 which process he says 20,000 lbs. of gold were annually obtained 
 in Asturia, Gallaecia, and Lusitania, he proceeds : "Gold obtained 
 by shafting (arrugia) does not require refining, but is straight- 
 way pure. Nuggets of it are found in this way ; likewise in pits 
 nuggets are found exceeding ten pounds each. The Spaniards 
 call them palacrae, others palacranae. The same people term 
 the gold dust halux^." Here then we have an interesting group 
 of technical terms, arrugia, palacra or palacrana and halux. 
 The latter forms at once remind us of Strabo's palae (m-aXai), 
 and we can have little doubt that palacra and pala are simply 
 dialectic variants, just as palacrana evidently was considered 
 by Pliny to be a bye-form of palacra. Corssen has sought to 
 find a Latin etymology for arrugia, connecting it with rwnco, 
 rv^a, but it is hardly possible to regard it as otherwise than 
 Spanish, especially as this appears to be the only place where it 
 is found. Balux (also baluca) is undoubtedly a native Iberian 
 term. On Schrader's principles we might at once argue that as 
 the technical words for gold-mining and for the different kinds 
 of gold are native Spanish words, it is beyond doubt that the 
 Spaniards were acquainted with gold and knew the art of 
 working it before any foreign traders brought that metal to 
 them. Without dogmatizing in this fashion and keeping to 
 
 1 Pliny, H. N. xxxiii. 4, 21 aurum arrugia quaesitnm non ooquitur sed 
 statim sunm est ; inueniuntur ita massae ; necnon in puteis denas excedentes 
 libras ; palaoras Hispani, alii palacranas, iidem quod minutum est baluoem 
 uocant. 
 
 May the French paille (in the phrase pailles cCor), Ital. paluola, Span. 
 palazuola, all used technically of gold, be derived from pala, the old technical 
 term, rather than from palea, chaff ? 
 
102 THE DISTBIBUTION OF THE OX 
 
 our more cautious principles we may say that the evidence of 
 those words is strongly in favour of such a conclusion, unless 
 a Semitic origin be sought for those terms, which is highly 
 improbable. For we know beyond doubt that the Spanish 
 mines were worked for centuries before ever a Eoman soldier 
 passed the Ebro. Unless then the technical terms were intro- 
 duced by the Greeks (which they were not, as Strabo considers 
 pala a native word) or by the Phoenicians, they are ancient 
 Iberic terms connected with gold from its first discovery. We 
 saw that in the Red Sea the first form in which gold was 
 utilized by the Arabs was that of nuggets used as rude beads. 
 The palae of the Iberians may represent the same period of 
 development as well as the same kind of gold. From the tradi- 
 tions given us by the ancient writers there can be little doubt 
 that the art of mining silver was of extremely ancient date in 
 Spain. The founding of Gadeira (Cadiz) is placed at 1100 B.C. 
 and the tradition of Posidonius regards the Phoenician colonies 
 in the west as long posterior to their trading for silver with 
 the rude natives. If this tradition could be relied on, silver 
 must have been known to the Spaniards in the twelfth century 
 B.C. And there is no reason to doubt the story. At Mycenae 
 gold and silver were found along with Baltic amber. The two 
 former prove that amongst the civilized races around the Aegean 
 the precious metals were abundantly used, the latter that the 
 trade routes across Europe from the Baltic and North Sea to 
 the Adriatic were already in use. Accordingly there is no 
 improbability in the supposition that in the twelfth century B.C. 
 the shipmen of Tyre traded for silver to North Eastern Spain 
 as well as to Northern Italy for amber. If the knowledge of 
 silver came so early in Spain, much earlier must that of gold 
 have been. 
 
 Let us now take a general survey of the region over which 
 we have travelled. In the far east we had both the literary 
 evidence of the Rig Veda and the evidence of the traditions and 
 legends handed down by the historians to show that well back 
 in the second millennium B.C. the gold deposits of Thibet were 
 known and worked. Silver is as yet unknown to the people of 
 the Rig Veda. Again in the region of the Altai and Oural 
 
AND THE DISTRIBUTION OF GOLD. 103 
 
 mountains, the tale of the "Arimaspian pursued by a griffin" 
 pointed to great antiquity for gold-mining in this district ; the 
 barbarous Massagetae', who occupied the modem Mongolia and 
 Sangaria, were rich in gold; and to the west the Scythians, 
 who used neither silver nor copper, had abundant store of gold. 
 These tribes stretched right across Russia until they touched on 
 the west the Getae and the other tribes of the great Thracian 
 stock. Gold must early have been known throughout all Thrace. 
 Greek tradition and history unite in demonstrating the great 
 antiquity of the first Phoenician gold-seeking in Thasos and on 
 the mainland. The evidence in Greece itself puts it beyond 
 doubt that gold was in use 1500 years B.C. The Balkan Penin- 
 sula was occupied on the north-west by Illyrian tribes, some 
 of whom, like the Dardani, dwelt interspersed among the 
 Thracian clans. The Illyrians inhabited all the northern end 
 of the Adriatic, and originally much of the east side of all 
 Italy, although under the pressure of the Umbrians and Kelts 
 they had been almost completely crushed out of the Italian 
 Peninsula, only maintaining themselves in the extreme south- 
 east where the Messapians remained independent of both 
 Italian and Greek alike. The Keltic tribes were their neigh- 
 bours in Noricum, where they had succeeded the ancient Rhae- 
 tian stock, the survivors of which, like the Salassi, had managed 
 to maintain themselves in the fastnesses of the Alps. We found 
 strong evidence that these Rhaetians must long have known 
 the art of working gold, for they had devised elaborate pieces of 
 engineering work for the purpose of developing their gold fields ; 
 added to this was the fact that gold as an ornament seems to 
 have been used by the inhabitants of the Swiss lake dwellings 
 in the neolithic age. The Kelts must have been in contact 
 with this people for a coasiderable time before they ever invaded 
 Italy ; again in Spain we found every token of great antiquity 
 in the working of gold and silver. Again, before they iavaded 
 Italy, the Kelts must have been long in contact with the 
 Iberians of what in later days was Aquitania, for the Keltic 
 conquest of Northern Spain can hardly be placed later than in 
 the fifth century B.C., and it is most probable that that con- 
 
 ' Herod, iv. 11. 
 
104 THE DISTRIBUTION OF THE OX, ETC. 
 
 quest only took. place after long and stubborn struggles. The 
 Kelts too in Southern Gaul must have come in contact with 
 the Ligyes (or Ligurians), whose territory at one time extended 
 from the Iberus (Ebro) along the coast of the Mediterranean 
 to the frontiers of Etruria. The Ligurians had been in touch 
 with the Iberians on their western border; in fact the two 
 races had blended to a considerable degree, and since they had 
 also had communication with Etruscans, Phoenicians and Greeks 
 (with the last from at least 600 B.C., when Massilia was founded 
 in their country), it is impossible to suppose that this people 
 could have remained ignorant of the use of gold. The Kelts 
 thus at every point along their southern front, as they advanced, 
 must have been for centuries in full knowledge of gold before 
 they ever entered Rome. Add to this the fact that when 
 they entered Italy they appear to have brought nothing but 
 their gold ornaments and their cattle, and that in Gaul it had 
 been the habit to dedicate great piles of the precious metal in 
 the sacred precincts of their divinities. 
 
CHAPTER IV. 
 Primaeval Trade Routes. 
 
 There can be little doubt that from the extreme West of 
 Europe to Northern India, or rather to China and the Pacific 
 shore, there was complete intercourse in the way of trade, from 
 the most remote epochs. In the lake dwellings of Switzerland 
 are found implements of Jade, a stone which is not found at 
 any spot in Europe; in fact the nearest point from which the 
 material was fetched must have been Eastern Turkestan on the 
 borders of China^ If in neolithic days such communication 
 
 ' How trade was carried on in early days may be well illustrated from 
 Torres Straits of to-day. (Haddon, " The Western Tribe of Torres Straits," 
 Journal of Anthrop. Inst. xix. p. 347.) 
 
 Dance masks made of turtle sbell (340) occasionally used as money. 
 
 If a Muralug man wanted a canoe he would communicate with a friend at 
 Moa, who would speak to a friend of his at Badu ; possibly the Muralug man 
 might himself go to Badu, or treat with a friend there. The Badu man would 
 cross to Mabuiag to make arrangements, and a Mabuiag man would proceed to 
 Saibai. 
 
 If there was no canoe available at the latter place word would be sent on, 
 along the coast, that a canoe was to be cut out and sent down. 
 
 The canoe would then retrace the course of the verbal order and ultimately 
 find its way to Muralug. The annual payment for a canoe was say three dibi 
 dibi or goods of about equal value. There were three annual instalments. 
 
 There is no money in the Straits ; but certain articles have acquired a gene- 
 rally recognized exchange value, a value which is intrinsic, and not irrespective 
 of the rarity of the material or the workmanship put into it. These objects 
 cannot be regarded as money ; they are the round shell ornaments {4ibi dibi, 
 shell armlet, wai wai, dugong, harpoon, wap, and canoe). A good wai wai is 
 the most valuable possession ; the exchange of a wai wai was a canoe, or 
 harpoon. Ten or twelve dibi dibi was considered of equal value to any of the 
 above. A wife was the highest unit of exchange, being valued at a canoe, or a 
 wap or wai wai. " The intermediaries (in the purchase of a canoe) are paid 
 
106 PRIMAEVAL TRADE ROUTES. 
 
 existed between Further Asia and Western Europe, it is not 
 unreasonable to suppose that when gold, an article existing 
 in almost every country across the two continents, came into 
 use, a like facility of intercourse must have existed. In one of 
 the passages of Herodotus which I have given above we had 
 explicit information respecting a trade route extending from 
 the Greek factories on the northern shores of the Black 
 Sea through the medium of the Scythians right away to the 
 remote region of the Altai. On the other hand there is good 
 evidence for the existence of a great trade route from the Black 
 Sea westward up the valley of the Danube, and so reaching the 
 head of the Adriatic ; and again, there is equally good reason for 
 believing that from the mouth of the Po there ran a similar 
 route across Northern Italy through Liguria and Narbonese 
 Gaul and into Spain. In reference to the first of these routes 
 we may quote a tradition preserved in the Book of Wonderful 
 Stories before alluded to. It is there stated that once on a time 
 travellers who had voyaged up the Danube finally by a branch 
 of that river which flowed into the Adriatic made their way 
 into that Sea. It is there alleged' that "there is a mountain 
 called Delphium between Mentorice and Istriana, which has 
 a lofty peak. Whenever the Mentores who dwell on the 
 Adriatic mount this crest, they see, as it appears, the ships 
 which are sailing into the Pontus (Black Sea). And there is 
 likewise a certain spot in the intervening region in which, 
 when a common mart is held, Lesbian, Ghian and Thasian wares 
 are set out for sale by the merchants who come up from the 
 Black Sea, and Corcyraean wine jars by those who come up 
 from the Adriatic. They say likewise that the Ister, taking its 
 rise in what are called the Hercynian forests, divides in twain, 
 and disembogues by one branch into the Black Sea, and by the 
 other into the Adriatic. And we have seen a proof of this not 
 only in modern times, but likewise still more so in antiquity, 
 as to how the regions there are easy of navigation (reading 
 
 for their services 'by charging on,' the amount depending on individual 
 cupidity, or they may be recompensed for their trouble by presents from the 
 purchaser " (p. 341). 
 
 1 [Aristotle,] De Uiris Auscult. 104—5 (839» 34 seqq.). 
 
PRIMAEVAL TRADE ROUTES. 107 
 
 6V7r\(0Ta). For the story goes that Jason sailed in by the 
 Cyanean Rocks, but sailed out from the Black Sea by the Ister." 
 
 The story of the meeting between the traders from the 
 Black Sea and Adriatic has every mark of probability, whilst we 
 are possibly justified in regarding the legend of Jason as evi- 
 dence that for long ages the Greeks knew that up the valley 
 of the Danube traders frorri the Pontus made their way. 
 Doubtless too it was with a view to tapping the trade of this 
 very route that the trading factories like Istropolis were founded 
 on the Danube. 
 
 The branch of the Danube flowing into the Adriatic can 
 only mean that travellers from the Danube by passing up one 
 of its tributaries would reach a point from which it was but a 
 short journey to the Adriatic shore. But a famous story in 
 Herodotus will yield us more efiicient aid. To the Greeks of 
 the fifth century B.C. the extreme north was represented by the 
 land of those happy beings the Hyperboreans, just as the 
 furthest south was represented by the sources of the Nile. 
 Thus Pindar sings : " Countless broad paths of glorious exploits 
 have been cut out one after another beyond Nile's fountains 
 and through the land of the Hyperboreans \" 
 
 Some of the oldest legends of the young world's prime cluster 
 around this shadowy region. Herakles had wandered there in 
 quest of the hind of the golden horns, consecrated to Artemis 
 Orthosia by Taygeta"; "In quest of her he likewise beheld that 
 land behind the chilling north wind; there he stood and mar- 
 velled at the trees." The judge at the Olympic festival placed 
 round tbe locks of the victor " the dark green adornment of the 
 olive, which in days of yore Amphitryon's son had brought from 
 the shady sources of the Ister, a most glorious memorial of the 
 contests at Olympia, when he had won over by word the 
 Hyperborean folk that are the henchmen of Apollo'." The hero 
 Perseus too had reached that land where no ordinary mortal 
 could find his way; " Neither in ships nor yet on foot wouldst 
 
 1 Pind. Isth. V. 22 sq. fivplai 5' ipyiav Ka\<Sv TiTii-qvB^ iKaTi/iireSoi iv ffX^P^ 
 KdXevBoi. I Kal vipav Ne(Xoio vayav Koi Si' 'Xirep^opiovs. 
 
 2 01. in. 31 sq. 
 
 " 01. III. ISsqq. 
 
108 PRIMAEVAL TRADE ROUTES. 
 
 thou find out the marvellous ways to the assembly of the Hyper- 
 boreans, but once on a time did the chieftain Perseus enter 
 their houses and feast, having come upon them as they were 
 sacrificing glorious hecatombs of asses to the god. Now 
 Apollo takes continuous and especial delight in their ban- 
 quets and hymns of praise, and he laughs as he beholds the 
 rampant lewdness of the beasts'." 
 
 Herodotus felt puzzled where to place the Hyperboreans; 
 "For concerning Hyperborean men neither the Scythians say 
 anything to the point nor any other of those that dwell in this 
 region, save the Issedones. But as I think, not even do they say 
 anything to the point ; for in that case the Scythians too would 
 have told it, as they tell about the one-eyed people" (the 
 Arimaspians"). " But a certain Aristeas, the son of Caystrobius, 
 a man of Proconnesus, alleged in a poem that under the in- 
 fluence of divine afflatus he had reached the Issedones, and that 
 beyond them dwelt the Arimaspians who have but one eye, and 
 that beyond these are the gold-guarding griffins, and beyond 
 these the Hyperboreans, stretching to the sea'," But where 
 Pindar and Herodotus hesitated, the priest of Apollo at Delos 
 stepped in with an explicit statement of that "marvellous road" 
 which Pindar said no one could find by sea or land. Accordingly 
 Herodotus has to resort to the men of Delos for his information 
 about the Hyperboreans: "Much the longest account of them 
 is given by men of Delos, who have alleged that sacred objects 
 bound up in wheaten straw are brought from the Hyperboreans 
 to the Scythians, and that the Scythians receive them and pass 
 them on to their neighbours upon the west, who continue to 
 pass them on until at last they reach the Adriatic, and from 
 thence they are sent on southwards. First of the Greeks do the 
 men of Dodona receive them, and from them they travel down 
 to the Melian Gulf and cross over to Euboea, and city sends 
 them on to city as far as Carystus. The Carystians take them 
 over to Tenos without stopping at Andros; and the Tenians 
 convey them to Delos." Then he adds a further story that on 
 the first occasion the Hyperboreans sent two maidens, Hype- 
 
 1 Find. Pyth. x. 29 sgg. ' Herod, iv. 32. 
 
 3 Herod, iv. 13. 
 
PRIMAEVAL TRADE ROUTES. 109 
 
 rochd and Laodic6, with five male protectors, but as they died 
 at Delos, and returned home no more, they for this reason 
 "bring to their borders the sacred objects packed up in wheaten 
 straw and lay a solemn injunction on their neighbours, bidding 
 them send them forward to another nation, and the men say 
 that being forwarded in this fashion they arrive at Delos'." 
 
 From the various passages quoted we may draw the probable 
 conclusion that there was a well-defined trade route existing 
 for untold ages between the heart of Asia, the valley of the 
 Danube and the head of the Adriatic. The nameless poets who 
 framed the legends of Herakles and his wanderings would 
 certainly make the hero travel by the routes where both in 
 their own time and from tradition they knew of the existence 
 of highways from nation to nation. Thus in his journey to the 
 Hyperboreans Herakles is represented as having visited the 
 shady forests of the Danube, which points to the same road as 
 that assigned to the Hjrperborean maidens by the Delian tale. 
 Finally it may not be farfetched to conjecture that the sacrifice 
 of hecatombs of asses may be taken as evidence that the 
 Hyperborean legend points to a people of Central Asia, which 
 is the natural habitat of the wild ass. However, as it seems 
 that there was an annual sacrifice of asses to Apollo at Delphi^, 
 we must be careful not to lay much stress on this argument, 
 although it is quite possible that a vague knowledge of a far-off 
 region where asses abounded and were sacrificed may have 
 given the Greeks the idea that the Hyperboreans were wor- 
 shippers of their own god Apollo, at whose altar like offerings 
 were made. 
 
 Having seen some reasons for believing that before the 
 beginning of history there was a well-defined route from Central 
 and perhaps Further Asia across Southern Kussia to the valley 
 of the Danube, and then by one of the valleys of its tributaries 
 to within a short distance of the Adriatic, whence after crossing 
 the watershed it reached the head of that sea, we are now 
 in a position to enquire whether we have similar evidence for the 
 further continuance towards the west of this highroad of nations. 
 
 ' Herod, iv. 33. 
 
 2 Boeekh, Corp. Inscr. Graec. Vol. i. p. 807. 
 
110 PRIMAEVAL TRADE ROUTES. 
 
 We have had occasion already to remark that the legends of 
 the Voyage of the Argo in quest of the Golden Fleece, and the 
 joumejings of Herakles and such-like stories, really represent the 
 earliest knowledge of the regions which lay far away to the east 
 and north-west. There is no tale of the hero Herakles more famous 
 than that of his travelling to the very marge of Ocean, where in 
 the Pillars of Hercules he left an imperishable record of his 
 wayfaring for the men of aftertime. His object, so goes the 
 story, was the capture of the famous kine of the giant Geryon 
 who dwelt in the island of Erythia, in after years the site of 
 Gaddir, or Gadeira as the Greeks called it, the Gades of the 
 Romans, and the modem Cadiz. Many vague stories relating 
 to the early ethnology of Western Europe and Northern Africa 
 cycle round this expedition*. But for our present purpose it is 
 only the fabled route by which he went with which we are 
 concerned. As might naturally be expected that part of Italy 
 with which the Greeks seem first to have become acquainted 
 was the district lying in the Adriatic around the mouths of the 
 Po (Eridanus). The reason why they came thither is not far to 
 seek. They doubtless simply followed the example of the 
 Phoenicians who probably had long traded thither to obtain 
 both the highly prized golden amber from the Baltic, and the 
 red amber of Liguria, called from that region Lingurium, or 
 ligurion, a name for which the Greeks found a strange ety- 
 mology which connected it with the lynx''. According to 
 Herodotus, "the Phocaeans were the first of the Greeks who 
 made long voyages and discovered Adria, Tyrsenia (Etruria), 
 Iberia and Tartessus" (i. 163). The trade routes to the amber 
 coasts of the north have long been well known ; they passed over 
 the Alps, crossed the Danube at Passau, Linz or Presburg, and 
 proceeded then either to Samland or to the vicinity of Jutland". 
 As these northern routes crossed that which came up the valley 
 
 > Cf. SaUust, Jug. 18. 
 
 ^ They derived it from 'Kiy^ and ovpov. The difference in colour between 
 the Baltic and Ligurian amber found an easy explanation, the latter was regarded 
 as the solidified urine of the female lynx, the former of the male animal. Pliny, 
 H. N. xxxvn. 2, § 34. 
 
 ^ Cf. Boyd Dawkius, Early Man in Britain, 466. Von Sadowski, Die 
 Handelstrassen der Griechen und Ramer, p. 15. 
 
PRIMAEVAL TRADE ROUTES. Ill 
 
 of the Danube, we see that by this route there was complete 
 communication between the Black Sea and the Adriatic. In 
 later times we know that active trade was carried on with all 
 Northern Italy from Marseilles along by the Ligurian shore, for 
 the coinage of Massalia, and the barbarous imitations of it struck 
 
 Fig. 15. Barbarous imitation of Drachm of Massalia. 
 
 by the peoples of what was afterwards known as Cisalpine 
 Gaul, formed the currency of that region until the Roman 
 Conquest. But once more the Book of Wonderful Stories comes 
 to our aid: "They say that from Italy into Keltik^, and the 
 land of the Keltoligyes and Iberians, there is a certain road 
 called that of Herakles, by which if any journey, whether 
 Greek or native, he is protected by those who dwell along it, 
 that he may suffer no wrong. For those in whose vicinity the 
 wrong is done have to pay the penalty." Here we have a clear 
 instance of a well-defined caravan route, connected by Greek 
 tradition with the name of Herakles, which was placed under a 
 kind of taboo, so that all travellers could use it with impunity. 
 We may then conclude that as from Central Asia there was un- 
 broken communication with Northern Italy, so likewise from 
 Northern Italy there was from remote ages a definite trade 
 route into Gaul and Spain, and that these routes were in turns 
 connected with the great routes which lead from the Mediter- 
 ranean to the Baltic and North Sea. 
 
CHAPTER V. 
 
 The Art of Weighing was first employed for Gold. 
 
 We have seen in the preceding pages that from the Atlantic 
 seaboard right across into Further Asia the ox was universally 
 spread, and from a period long before the daybreak of history 
 already formed the chief element of property amongst the 
 various races of mankind which occupied that wide region. We 
 have likewise seen, that gold was very equally distributed over 
 the same area, being ready to hand in the still unexhausted 
 deposits in the sands of rivers. And lastly we have seen that 
 from the most remote times there was complete communication 
 for purposes of trade between the various stocks. For whilst 
 peoples in the pastoral and nomad stage do not dwell together 
 in large communities they nevertheless are within touch of one 
 another. No better illustration of this can be found than the 
 relations between Abraham and Lot as set forth in Genesis 
 (xiii. 5 sqq.): "And Lot also, which went with Abram, had 
 flocks, and herds, and tents. And the land was not able to 
 bear them, that they might dwell together : for their substance 
 was great, so that they could not dwell together. And there 
 was a strife between the herdmen of Abram's cattle and the 
 herdmen of Lot's cattle: and the Canaanite and the Perizzite 
 dwelled then in the land. And Abram said unto Lot, Let 
 there be no strife, I pray thee, between me and thee, and 
 between my herdmen and thy herdmen; for we be brethren. 
 Is not the whole land before thee ? separate thyself, I pray 
 thee, from me : if thou wilt take the left hand, then I will go 
 to the right ; or if thou depart to the right hand, then I will 
 go to the left. And Lot lifted up his eyes, and beheld all the 
 plain of Jordan, that it was well watered every where, before 
 
THE ART OF WEIGHING WAS FIRST EMPLOYED FOR GOLD. 113 
 
 the Lord destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah, even as the garden 
 of the Lord, like the land of Egypt, as thou comest unto 
 Zoar. Then Lot chose him all the plain of Jordan; and Lot 
 journeyed east: and they separated themselves the one from 
 the other. Abram dwelled in the land of Canaan, and Lot 
 dwelled in the cities of the plain, and pitched his tent toward 
 Sodom." But although, from the necessity of finding sufficient 
 pasturage for their flocks and herds, they had parted from one 
 another, they remained within touch. For we find that no 
 sooner had Lot and his possessions been carried away by 
 Chedorlaomer and his confederates, after the overthrow of the 
 kings of Sodom and Gomorrah, than Abraham at once hears of 
 his mishap and hastens to his rescue (xiv. 13 sqq.). 
 
 The picture here given may be taken as holding good for a 
 large part of Asia and Europe. There is a great intermingling 
 of various races and untrammeled intercourse between the 
 various communities. Thus we find that Abraham was able to 
 journey from Haran into Egypt with his flocks and herds and 
 suffered harm or hindrance of no man. Nay, a still stronger 
 proof of the safety and freedom of intercourse is that when 
 Abraham entered Egypt, although afraid that if it were known 
 that Sarah was his wife the Egyptians might murder him, yet 
 he had no fear that they would take her away by force if she 
 was supposed to be his sister. Thus, when his princes told 
 Pharaoh that the Hebrew woman was fair to look on, though 
 the king commanded her to be taken into his house, he did 
 not act with high-handed violence against the stranger, but 
 " he entreated Abram well for her sake : and he had sheep, 
 and oxen, and he asses, and menservants, and maidservants, and 
 she asses, and camels." And when Pharaoh discovered that she 
 was really Abraham's wife, although on account of Abraham's 
 mendacity the Lord had " plagued Pharaoh and his house with 
 great plagues because of Abraham's wife," he did not, as he might 
 very justly have done, take a summary vengeance upon him, 
 " he commanded his men concerning him : and they sent him 
 away, and his wife, and all that he had." (Gen. xii. 12 — 20.) 
 
 Such then being the general distribution of cattle and 
 sheep, and such again the distribution of gold, we can have 
 R. 8 
 
114 THE ART OF WEIGHING 
 
 little hesitation in coming to the conclusion that the ox, which 
 we have evidence to show was the chief unit of value in all 
 those countries, had the same value throughout, and in like 
 manner that gold would have almost the same value over all 
 the area in which we have shown that it was so impartially- 
 apportioned out by Nature. From this it follows that if the 
 unit of gold was fixed upon the older unit, the ox, the same 
 quantity of gold would be found serving as the metallic unit 
 throughout the same wide area. 
 
 If then it can be proved that throughout the area in 
 which those weight standards arose from which all the known 
 systems of the ancient, mediaeval, and modem world were de- 
 rived, the same gold-unit is found everywhere, and that wher- 
 ever evidence is to hand, this unit is regarded as equal in value 
 to a cow or ox, the truth of our hypothesis will have been 
 demonstrated. For it would be impossible that such an oc- 
 currence should be a mere coincidence if found repeated in 
 different areas. Furthermore, if it can be shown that in cases 
 at a comparatively late historical period peoples who were 
 borrowing a ready-made metallic system from more civilized 
 neighbours, have found it impossible to do so without ad- 
 justing or equating such metallic standard to their own unit of 
 barter, we may infer a fortiori that it would have been im- 
 possible for any people to have framed a metallic unit for the 
 first time for themselves without any reference to the unit of 
 barter. But as we have already proved that the unit of barter 
 is in every case earlier in existence than even the very know- 
 ledge of the precious metals, it follows irresistibly that the 
 metallic unit is based on the unit of barter. We have also 
 given reasons for believing that gold was the first of the metals 
 known to primitive man, but as yet we have not proved that 
 the metals are the first objects to be weighed. If this can 
 be proved, and if furthermore it can be proved that before silver 
 or copper or iron were yet weighed, gold has been weighed by 
 that standard, which we find universal in later times, we have 
 still more closely narrowed down our argument and put it 
 beyond all reasonable doubt that weighing was first invented 
 for traffic in gold, and since the weight-unit of gold is found 
 
WAS FIRST EMPLOYED FOR GOLD. 115 
 
 regularly to be the value of a cow or ox, the conclusion must 
 follow that the unit of weight is ultimately derived from the 
 value in gold of a cow. 
 
 If we begin in modem times and reflect on the articles 
 which are usually sold by weight, we find at once that the 
 more valuable and less bulky the commodity, the more 
 regularly is it sold and bought by the medium of the scales 
 and weights ; furthermore, on enquiry we find that many kinds 
 of goods which are now sold by weight were formerly sold 
 simply by bulk or measure. At the present moment com is 
 generally sold by weight (though sometimes still by measure), 
 although the nomenclature connected with its buying and 
 selling shows beyond doubt that formerly it was sold entirely 
 by dry measure. The English coomb, the Irish barrel, the 
 bushel and the peck are indubitable evidence. The selling of 
 live cattle by weight has only lately been adopted in some 
 markets in this country; but go back to a more remote period, 
 and you will find that even dead cattle were not sold by weight. 
 Thus we see that it is only in a comparatively late epoch that 
 two of the chief commodities on which human life depends 
 for subsistence have been trafficked in by weight. Nothing 
 now remains but man's clothing, weapons, ornaments, fuel and 
 furniture. 
 
 The more primitive the condition of life, the more scanty 
 and rude is the household furniture, and as even in modem 
 times timber is not sold by weight, beyond all doubt the 
 same must hold good in a still stronger degree of a time when 
 wood could be had for the mere trouble of sallying forth 
 with an axe and cutting it. The same argument applies 
 cogently to the question of fuel. For even though coal is 
 now sold by weight, both coal and coke are still sold in some 
 places at least in name by the chaldron, a fact that indicates 
 that it was only when facilities increased for weighiag large 
 and bulky commodities that such a practice came into vogue. 
 Similarly, although firewood is now sold by weight on the 
 Continent, beyond all doubt at a previous period it was uni- 
 formly sold by bulk, as peat or turf is now sold in Cambridge- 
 shire, in Scotland, and in Ireland. 
 
 8—2 
 
116 THE ART OF WEIGHING 
 
 Weapons and ornaments and utensils now only remain. To 
 take the last-named first, at no period have vessels of earthen- 
 ware been sold by weight. On the other hand those of metal, 
 especially when made of copper and iron, are usually sold in 
 this fashion, although vessels of iron and tin are commonly 
 sold by bulk, or according to their capacity, thereby following, 
 as we shall shortly see, a most ancient precedent. The value 
 of ornaments largely consists in the artistic skill displayed in 
 their manufacture, hence weight is not employed in estimating 
 their value except when the material is gold or silver, and 
 therefore possesses a certain intrinsic value apart from the mere 
 workmanship. We may therefore infer that in early times no 
 decorative articles save those in metal were valued by weight. 
 Next comes the question of weapons, one of the most important 
 sides of ancient life. Of course gold and silver are unfit for 
 weapons and implements, save in the case of the gods, as for 
 instance the chariot of Hera, with its wheel-naves of silver 
 and its tires of gold'. The spear-head and sword -blade must 
 be made from tougher and cheaper metals. Hence copper or 
 bronze (copper alloyed with tin) in the earlier periods which 
 succeeded the stone age, and iron at a later time, have mainly 
 provided mankind with weapons of offence and defence. But 
 precious as copper and bronze and iron were to the primitive 
 man, we do not find them sold by weight: a simple process 
 was employed ; the crude metal was made into pieces or bars 
 of certain dimensions, so many finger-breadths or thumb- 
 breadths long, so many broad, so many thick, just as wooden 
 planks are now sold with us, when the value of a piece of 
 timber is estimated by its being so many feet of inch board, 
 or half-inch board, and of a fixed width. Lastly we come to 
 the question of clothing. Skins of course were sold by bulk, 
 the hide of an ox or a sheepskin having generally a fixed 
 and constant value. Even when sheep came to be shorn 
 the fleece was set at an average value. But beyond all doubt 
 among the peoples who dwelt around the Mediterranean the 
 practice of weighing wool was of a most respectable antiquity. 
 Such, too, was the practice all through the middle ages in 
 
 > II. V. 720 seqq. 
 
WAS FIRST EMPLOYED FOR GOLD. 117 
 
 England and on the Continent. We have abundant speci- 
 mens still left of the weights carried by the wool merchants, 
 slung over the back of a pack-horse. 
 
 Having said so much by way of preliminary, we can now 
 adduce testimony in support of our thesis. Once more let 
 us start with the Homeric Poems. The weighing of gold is 
 already in vogue, but the highest unit known is the small talent, 
 the value of an ox, weighing 130-5 grs, or 10-15 grs more than 
 a sovereign. Silver is not yet estimated by weight, although 
 large and handsome vessels of that metal are described and have 
 their value appraised. But it is not by their weight that their 
 value is estimated, but by their capacity. Thus as first prize 
 for the footrace Achilles gave " a wine-mixer of silver, wrought, 
 and it held six measures, but it surpassed by far in beauty 
 all others upon earth, since cunning craftsmen, the Sidonians, 
 had carefully worked it, and Phoenician men brought it over 
 the misty deep." {Iliad, xxiiL 741 sqq.) Here we have a 
 vessel wrought in silver evidently of considerable size, but it is 
 simply by its content that its size and value are expressed. 
 Among the lists of prizes in the same book we find the size 
 of vessels made of copper or bronze similarly indicated. Thus 
 the first prize for the chariot race consisted of a woman skilled 
 in goodly tasks; and a tripod with ears, which held two and 
 twenty measures; whilst the third prize was a lehes or kettle 
 which had never yet been blackened by the fire, still with all 
 the glitter of newness, which held four measures. So, too, in 
 the case of iron. As the prize for the Hurling of the Quoit, 
 Achilles set down a mass of pig iron, which he had taken 
 from Eetion. It is a piece of metal as yet unwrought, so 
 that here if anywhere its size and value ought to be reckoned 
 by weight, since no account has to be taken of workmanship. 
 But Achilles, instead of saying that it weighs so many talents 
 or minae, describes its value in a far more primitive fashion. 
 " Even if his fat lands be very far remote, it will last him five 
 revolving seasons. For not through want of iron will his 
 shepherd or ploughman go to the town, but it (the mass) will 
 supply him'." 
 
 ^ II. 3[xiii. 826 seqq. 
 
118 THE ART OF WEIGHING 
 
 Thus of the four chief metals mentioned in the Homeric 
 Poems, gold alone is subjected to weight. But the scales are 
 used for another purpose still. In the Twelfth Book of the 
 Iliad there is a curious simile wherein a fight between the 
 Trojans and Achaeans is likened to the weighing of wool : 
 " So they held on as an honest, hardworking woman holds the 
 scales, who holding a weight and wool apart lifts them up, 
 making them equal, in order that she may win a humble pit- 
 tance for her children: thus their fight and war hung evenly until 
 what time Zeus gave masterful glory to Hector, Priam's son\" 
 
 Without doubt one of the first uses to which the art of 
 weighing was applied, was that of testing the amount of wool 
 given to female slaves", or in this case perhaps to a freed 
 woman, to make sure that they would return all the wool 
 when spun into yam, and not purloin any portion for them- 
 selves. Thus in the older Latin writers we constantly find 
 allusions to the pensum {pendo = to weigh), the portion of wool 
 weighed out to the slave. It is quite possible that in the sale 
 of wool the more ancient conventional fashion of estimating 
 the fleece as worth so much in other familiar commodities long 
 continued for mercantile purposes, the weighing of the wool in 
 small portions being only used as a check on the dishonesty 
 of the spinners. At all events we have found wool estimated 
 by the fleece in mediaeval Ireland, at a time when weights are 
 in common use for the metals. 
 
 Such then is the condition of things in the Homeric Poems. 
 Gold is transferred by weight and by weight wool is appor- 
 tioned out for spiiming. 
 
 1 II. XII. 433—7, 
 
 ctXX' ^ov, ws re TdXavra yvv^ x^P^V'^'-^ a\»;^^s, 
 •ij re ffradfiov ^xov(Ta Kal etptov ofKpls ai/^X/cet 
 LO-d^ova-" iVa TraLfflv deiK^a fU(r06v dpTjrax, 
 ws fxh TOJi/ ^TTL Taa fidxrj t^twtcu irroXe/ws re k.t.X. 
 
 Dr Leaf, in hie introduction to Book xii., when calling attention to various marks 
 of lateness in this book, says : " It has further, been remarked with some truth 
 that the numerous similes, though beautiful in themselves, are often dispro- 
 portionately elaborated and lead up to points which are almost in the nature 
 of an anti-climax." But the use of the word dXijfl^s in an entirely un-Homeric 
 sense seems to make it almost certain that these lines are of late date. 
 
 2 Cf. Plautus, Merc. ii. 3. 63. Virg. Georg. i. 390, carpentes pensa puellae. 
 
WAS FIRST EMPLOYED FOR GOLD. 119 
 
 Let US now turn to the Old Testament and find what are 
 the objects which are dealt in by weight. All transactions in 
 money are thus carried on, as for instance the purchase by 
 Abraham of the Cave of Machpelah from Ephron the Hittite 
 when "Abraham weighed to Ephron the silver, which he had 
 named in the audience of the sons of Heth, four hundred 
 shekels of silver, current Tnoney with the merchant" (Gen. 
 xxiii. 16). So likewise in Achan's confession: "I saw among 
 the spoils a goodly Babylpnish garment, and two hundred 
 shekels of silver, and a wedge of gold of fifty shekels weight " 
 (Joshua vii. 21). And so too in the Book of Judges (viii. 26) 
 the weight of the rings taken from the Midianites and given 
 to Gideon was " a thousand and seven hundred shekels of gold ; 
 beside ornaments, and collars, and purple raiment that was on 
 the kings of Midian, and beside the chains that were about 
 their camels' necks." And again David bought the threshing- 
 floor of Oman the Jebusite for six hundred shekels of gold by 
 weight (1 Chron. xxi. 25), although the same purchase is de- 
 scribed in 2 Samuel (xxiv. 24) as being effected for fifty 
 shekels of silver. In Solomon's time gold has become ex- 
 ceedingly abundant, and we find it reckoned by talents and 
 minae (pounds). For " king Solomon made a navy of ships in 
 Ezion-geber, which is beside Eloth, on the shore of the Red 
 sea, in the land of Edom. And Hiram sent in the navy his 
 servants, shipmen that had knowledge of the sea, with the 
 servants of Solomon. And they came to Ophir, and fetched 
 from thence gold, four hundred and twenty talents, and brought 
 it to king Solomon " (1 Kings ix. 26 — 8). And after the story 
 of the Queen of Sheba's visit and her gift to the king of " an 
 hundred and twenty talents of gold, and of spices very great 
 store, and precious stones," we read that " the weight of gold 
 that came to Solomon in one year was six hundred threescore 
 and six talents of gold, beside that he had of the merchantmen, 
 and of the trafiick of the spice merchants, and of all the kings 
 of Arabia, and of the governors of the country. And king 
 Solomon made two hundred targets of beaten gold: six 
 hundred shekels of gold went to one target." Spices such as 
 myrrh, cinnamon, calamus and cassia (Exod. xxx. 23) were sold 
 
120 THE ART OF WEIGHING 
 
 by weight, being as costly as gold. The familiar description of 
 Goliath of Gath, the weight of whose coat of mail "was 
 five thousand shekels of brass," and whose "spear's head 
 weighed six hundred shekels of iron," will serve to show that 
 articles in the inferior metals were at that time estimated 
 according to weight by the Hebrews and their neighbours, the 
 Philistines. Of the weighing of wool we find no instance, but 
 it is quite possible that it was from the practice of weighing 
 wool that Absalom when he "polled his head, (for it was 
 at every year's end that he polled it : because the hair was 
 heavy on him, therefore he polled it :) he weighed the hair of 
 his head at two hundred shekels after the king's weight " (2 
 Sam. xiv. 26). But it is perhaps more probable that the habit 
 of weighing a child's hair against gold or silver to fulfil a vow 
 (which was almost certainly Absalom's motive) may have 
 suggested the employment of the scales for wooP. 
 
 ^ Mr J. G. Frazer gives me the following interesting note : 
 As to the cutting ofl a chUd's hair and weighing it against gold or silver, 
 the facts are these. 
 
 (1) Among the Harari in Eastern Africa when a child is a few months old, 
 its hair is out off and weighed against silver or gold money ; the money is then 
 divided among the female relations of the mother. 
 
 Paulitsehke, Beitrage zur Ethnographie und Anthropologie der 
 Somal, Galla und Harari (Leipzig, 1886), p. 70. 
 
 (2) Mohammed's daughter Fatrma gave in alms the weight of her child's 
 hair in sUver. 
 
 W. Robertson Smith, Kinship and Marriage in early Arabia, 
 p. 153. 
 
 (3) Among the Mohammedans of the Punjaub a boy's hair is shaved off on 
 the 7th or 3rd day after birth, or sometimes immediately after birth. Rich 
 people give alms of silver coins equal in weight to the hair. 
 
 Punjab Notes and Queries, i., No. 66. 
 
 (4) When the Hindus of Bombay dedicate a, child to any god or purpose, 
 they shave its head and weigh the hair against gold or silver. 
 
 Id. II. No. 11. 
 
 (5) In the inland districts of Padang (Sumatra) three days after birth the 
 child's hair is cut off and weighed. Double the weight of hair in money is 
 given to the priest. 
 
 Pistorius. Studien over de inlandsche Huisponding in de Padangsche 
 Bovenlanden, p. 56; Van Hasselt, Volksbeschrijving van 
 Midden-Sumatra, p. 268. 
 
 (6) There is the Egyptian custom, for which we have the evidence of 
 Herodotus, ii. 65, and Diodorus, i. 8. 
 
WAS FIRST EMPLOYED FOR GOLD. 121 
 
 Finally, once in the prophet Ezekiel do we find food 
 weighed, but evidently under special circumstances: "And 
 thy meat which thou shalt eat shall be by weight, twenty 
 shekels a day: from time to time shalt thou eat it. Thou 
 shalt drink also water by measure, the sixth part of an hin: 
 from time to time shalt thou drink" (iv. 10, 11). In any case 
 we should expect to find traces of later usage in the writers 
 of the age of the prophets, but from the dfrections regarding 
 the amount of water, it is evident that we cannot take this 
 passage as a proof of the ordinary practice of the time. 
 
 Unfortunately our oldest records of Roman life and habits 
 go back but a short way before the Christian era, and hence 
 we cannot get much direct information as regards the first 
 objects which were sold by weight. We have already seen 
 that iu the time of Plautus {flor. 200 B.C.) the habit prevailed 
 of weighing wool out to the women slaves. 
 
 However, from the legal formula used in the solemn process 
 of conveyance of real property {res mancipi) per aes et libram, 
 we may perhaps infer that the scales were used for none but 
 precious articles such as copper, silver and gold. That they 
 were used for those! metals there can be little doubt. On the 
 other hand, as we find all kinds of corn sold at a later period 
 by dry measure, such as the modius or bushel, we may with 
 certainty conclude that such too had been the practice of the 
 earlier period. 
 
 From the literary remains then of the Greeks, Hebrews 
 and Latins, it is beyond all doubt that in the early stages of 
 society nothing is weighed but the metals and wool (for the 
 apportioning of tasks). In this the records of all three na- 
 tions agree, whilst from Homer we learn that the Greeks were 
 using gold by weight, when as yet neither silver, copper nor 
 fron was sold or appraised by that process. 
 
 To proceed then to a people compared to whom the Greek 
 and Hebrews in point of antiquity of civilization are but the 
 upstarts of yesterday. The Egyptians seem to have used 
 weight exclusively for the metals ; the Kat and its tenfold the 
 Uten seem always used in connection with metals, whilst corn 
 is always connected with measures of capacity. The following 
 
122 THE ART OF WEIGHING 
 
 instances taken from the list of prices of commodities given by 
 Brugsch {History of Egypt under the Pharaohs, II. p. 199, 
 English Transl.) will suffice for our purpose : a slave cost 3 tens 
 1 Kat of silver ; a goat cost 2 tens of copper ; 1 hotep of wheat 
 cost 2 tens of copper ; 1 tena of corn of Upper Egypt cost 5 — 7 
 tens of copper ; 1 hotep of spelt cost 2 tens of copper ; 1 hin of 
 honey 8 Kats of copper. Even drugs were not weighed by the 
 Egyptians in the time of Rameses II. The physicians pre- 
 scribed by measure, as we learn from the Medical papyrus 
 Ebers'. 
 
 Passing then to the far East, we naturally are curious to 
 learn whether the oldest literary monument of any branch of 
 the Aryan race, the Rig- Veda, throws any light on our question. 
 We get there but meagre help: but yet, scanty as it is, it is 
 of great importance. As we saw above the Indians of the 
 Vedic age were still ignorant of the use of silver, although 
 possessing both gold and copper. Now, whilst we have no evi- 
 dence bearing upon the latter metal, there are two very re- 
 markable and important words used in connection with gold 
 which beyond doubt refer to the weighing of that metal. In 
 the Mandala (viil. 67, 1 — 2 ; 687, 1 — 2) a hymn commences : 
 " O India, bring us rice-cake, a thousand Soma-drinks, and an 
 hundred cows, O hero, bring us apparel, cows, horses, jewels 
 along with a mana of gold." Again, " Ten horses, ten 
 caskets, ten garments, ten pindas of gold I received from 
 Divodasa. Ten chariots equipped with side-horses, and an 
 hundred cows gave A^vatha to the Atharvans and the Payu " 
 (Mandala, vi. 49, 23 — 4). As we shall have occasion later on 
 to deal with the terms mand and hiranya-pinda at greater 
 length, it will suffice our present purpose to point out that 
 we have a distinct mention of a weight of gold in the ex- 
 pression mand hiranyayd. In only these two passages have 
 we any allusion to weighing, and in both it is in direct con- 
 nection with gold. The Aryans of the Veda are beyond all 
 doubt in a far less civilized state than the Egyptians, Hebrews, 
 Greeks or Romans of the historical period. Hence we may 
 
 1 F. L. Griffith, "Metrology of the Medical Papyrus Ebers," Proceed, of See. 
 Bibl. Arch. June 1891. 
 
WAS FIRST EMPLOYED FOR GOLD. 123 
 
 without danger infer that they did not use weight for any 
 cereals they may have cultivated. Therefore we may, with a 
 good deal of probability, conclude that we have got a people 
 who had already a knowledge of the art of weighing before 
 they were acquainted with either silver or iron, and that this 
 people used the scales for gold and nothing else. This, taken 
 in connection with the fact that in Homer, although silver is 
 known, the weighing of metals is confined to gold, leads us 
 irresistibly to conclude that gold was the first of all substances 
 to be weighed, or, to put it in a different way, the art of 
 weighing was invented for gold. 
 
CHAPTER VI. 
 The Gold Unit everywhere the value of a Cow. 
 
 We have now proved four things : (1) the general distribution 
 of the ox throughout our area, (2) its universal employment as 
 the unit of value throughout the same region, (3) the equable 
 distribution of gold throughout the same countries, and (4) that 
 gold is the first of all commodities to be weighed. Our next 
 step will be to show that gold was weighed universally by the 
 same standard, and that this standard unit in all cases where 
 we can find record was regarded as the equivalent of the ox or 
 the cow. 
 
 We have already seen that the gold talent of the Homeric 
 Poems, which, was in use among the Greeks before the art of 
 stamping money had yet become known, weighed about 130 
 grains troy (8-4 grammes). In historical times gold was always 
 weighed on what was called the Euboic (or Euboic-Attic) 
 standard. Thus when Thasos began to strike gold coins in 
 411 B.C. after her revolt from Athens they weighed 135 grs. 
 Unless this had been the time-honoured unit employed for gold 
 in that island so famous for its mines the Thasians would hardly 
 have employed it. Certainly they would not adopt it simply 
 because it was the standard of the hated Athenians, especially 
 as they had a different standard for silver. 
 
 The gold coins of Athens struck a few years later are on the 
 same standard of 135 grs, and when Rhodes at the beginning 
 of the fourth century B.C. began to coin gold, she used the same 
 unit, although she employed for silver the unit of 240 grs. 
 Cyzicus also, although coining her well-known electrum 
 
THE GOLD UNIT EVERYWHERE THE VALUE OF A COW. 125 
 
 Gydcenes on the Phoenician standard, used the unit of 130 grs 
 for pure gold. 
 
 Fig. 16. Gold Stateb oi? Philip of Maoedon. 
 
 This standard, as we shall presently see, virtually remained 
 unchanged for gold down to the latest days of Greek indepen- 
 dence. It likewise prevailed in Macedonia and Thrace. For 
 when Philip II. coined the gold from the mines of Crenides 
 into staters on the so-called Attic standard of 135 grains, he 
 did nothing else than employ for the first gold coinage of his 
 country the unit which had there, as in Greece Proper, prevailed 
 for many ages for the weighing of gold. For since gold was 
 first coined in that region about 350 B.C., and yet silver coins had 
 been current in Thrace and Macedon since about 500 B.C., it 
 would be absurd to suppose that there was no unit by which 
 gold in. ingots or rings could be appraised. 
 
 I have shown elsewhere that the rings found by Dr 
 Schliemann at Mycenae were probably made on a standard 
 of 135 grains troy. It is natural to suppose that if within 
 the area of Greece Proper gold rings were fixed according to a 
 definite standard, and that standard the Homeric talent, the 
 Macedonians and Thracians would possess a similar unit in the 
 fifth century B.C. But there is a small piece of literary evidence 
 to show that the Macedonians were acquainted with the gold 
 unit, which we already know as the Homeric ox unit. Eusta- 
 thius tells us that "three gold staters formed the Macedonian 
 talents" Whether Mommsen is right in thinking that this 
 name was given to the talent in Eg3rpt in consequence of its 
 having been introduced by the Lagidae (themselves Macedonians) 
 or not, it equally indicates that from of old such a talent, con- 
 fined in use to gold, and the threefold of the Homeric ox-unit, 
 
 ^ Hultsch, Metrol. Scrip. 299, to MaxeSoviKliv raXavTov rpets riaav xpi<rii'oi. 
 
126 THE GOLD UNIT EVERYWHERE 
 
 had existed in Macedonia. Hence Philip 11. did not require to 
 go to Athens to seek for a standard for his new gold coinage. 
 
 Fig. 17. Peesiah Daeic. 
 
 Passing into Asia we find there the shekel as the Daric(Aa/3etKo?), 
 the normal weight of which is 130 grains troy. This standard 
 prevailed all through the Persian empire, thus extending into 
 the countries now represented by Afghanistan and Northern 
 India. Numismatists have pointed out the fact that Philip 
 coined his staters some five grains heavier than the rival gold 
 currency of the Persian empire, as if to enhance the estimation 
 of his new coinage. This explanation is perhaps over subtle; 
 
 Fig. 18. Gold Statek op Diodotus, King op Bactkia. 
 
 at all events it is interesting to find the successors of Alexander 
 the Great in the Far East, the kings of Bactria, coining their 
 staters not on the standard of 135 grains, but rather on that of 
 130, in other words following the native standard which the 
 Daric simply represented as a coin. Thus Dr Gardner* in his 
 Table of Normal Weights makes the Bactrian stater of what he 
 calls the Attic standard weigh 132 grains and the drachm 
 66 grains, and it is also admitted that from the time of Eucra- 
 tides the Greek kings of Bactria adopted a native standard. 
 
 This new standard seems to be identical with that called by 
 metrologists the Persian, on which [silver] coins were struck in 
 
 1 Catalogue of Greek Kings of Bactria, p. liix. 
 
THE VALUE OF A COW. 127 
 
 all parts of the Persian empire, notably the Sigli stamped with 
 the figure of the Persian king, which must have freely circulated 
 in the northern parts of India that paid tribute to the king. 
 Whether the reason given for the use of this standard is right or 
 not, we may see hereafter, when a different explanation will be 
 offered to the reader. That great Indian archaeologist. General 
 Cunningham', goes further, and maintains "that the earliest 
 Greek coins of India, those of Sophytes, are struck, not on the 
 Attic standard, but on a native standard which is based on the 
 rati or grain of abrus precatorius." Whatever may be the 
 ultimate decision of this dispute, it is enough for our purpose 
 that whilst undoubtedly a native silver standard sooner or later 
 replaced the Attic, so likewise the Attic standard, if used for 
 gold, did not remain at its full weight of 135 grains, but rather 
 approximated to that of the native standard of the Daric 
 (130 grains). It is almost certainly a native standard which 
 appears as the weight of the gold piece (suvarna) in the tables of 
 weights given in the Hindu treatise called Lilavati, written in 
 the seventh century A.D., before the Muhammadan conquest of 
 India, and which we shall notice presently at greater length. 
 This suvarna is the only unit for gold mentioned in the tables, 
 and its weight can be demonstrated to be about 140 grs troy. 
 That the gold unit only varied 10 grains in the course of 10 
 centuries is very remarkable. 
 
 Let us now return to the ancient peoples of Further 
 Asia Minor and Northern Africa. The Phoenicians and their 
 neighbours in historical times seem to have used the double of 
 the unit of 130 grains. It is quite possible that this doubling 
 of the unit can be explained by a simple principle, which 
 •will likewise fit in with the threefold of the same unit, which 
 we have just now had to deal with under its name of Macedonian 
 Talent. But how far this double unit prevailed in earlier times 
 among the Semites it is not easy to tell. However, the evidence 
 to be derived from the Old Testament is in favour of the 
 priority of the unit of 130 grains. But this is not all our 
 evidence. The Egyptian hieroglyphic inscriptions give us con- 
 
 ' Catalogue of Greek Kings of Bactria, p. Ixvii. 
 
128 
 
 THE GOLD UNIT EVERYWHERE 
 
 siderable information regarding the currency not simply of 
 Egypt itself but likewise of neighbouring countries. For 
 when Egypt was at the zenith of her glory great conquerors 
 like Thothmes III. and Rameses II. (the Sesostris of Herodotus) 
 carried their arms into all the surrounding lands and reduced 
 them to the position of tributary vassals. Many of the tablets 
 which recount their exploits contain the tale of the spoil, and 
 describe it as consisting amongst other things of gold rings. 
 
 The wall paintings which still survive the inroads of time, 
 and the still ruder hands of Arabs or tourist, constantly exhibit 
 representations of the payment of tribute. Again and again we 
 see the tribute money in the form of rings being weighed in 
 scales, "on which solid images of animals in stone or brass in 
 the shape of recumbent oxen took the place of our weights \" 
 
 Fia. 19. Egyptian Wall Paintins showing ihe Weighing of Gold Rings ^. 
 
 Erman gives several representations of such weighing scenes 
 (pp. 611 — 12), and infers from the fact that the weigh-master and 
 his scales are always present at such payments, that the scales 
 were the ordinary medium of such payments. Mere pictures 
 however do not tell us anything about the weight of the rings 
 therein pourtrayed. Fortunately however we have examples 
 
 ' Brugsch, Op. cit. i. 386. ^ Lepsius, Denkrmler, 331. 
 
THE VALUE OF A COW. 129 
 
 of such rings. Brandish who was the first to seek for the unit 
 on which these rings were fashioned, thought that they followed 
 the heavy shekel (260 grs.), the double of our common unit. 
 On the other hand F. Lenormant'* thinks that they are really 
 based on the light shekel, or rather on a lighter variety of the 
 light shekel, of about 127 grains, and he is followed in this by 
 Hultsch'. For our purpose it matters not whether the rings 
 were made on the simple unit or its double, for there are not 
 really two separate standards but simply one and the same. 
 It is hardly likely that the Pharaohs would have done other- 
 wise than the kings of Persia at a later time, who made their 
 subject countries pay their tribute in the recognized currency of 
 the kingdom, the gold being reckoned (as Herodotus says) by 
 the Euboic talent, the silver by the Babylonian talent. There 
 can then be but little doubt that these gold rings give us either 
 actually the old Egyptian standard, or a standard so closely 
 related to it that there was to all intents and purposes no 
 material distinction between them. 
 
 Schliemann noticed a resemblance between some of the 
 rings found at Mycenae and those represented in Egyptian 
 paintings. It is not preposterous to suppose that the rings 
 of Mycenae represent a kind of ring both in form and 
 weight which was employed by the peoples of Asia Minor and 
 Egypt, as well as in Greece. The contact between Egypt and 
 Asia Minor is so close, communication so free, that it would be 
 in itself most unlikely that any wide divergence of currency 
 would exist in earlier times, whilst on the other hand her 
 relations with the people of Ethiopia and Libya were likewise so 
 close that they forbid any other conclusion. This is proved 
 by the statement of Horapollo that the Monad (fiovd^), which 
 the Egyptians held to be the basis of all numeration, was equal 
 to two drachms, that is, to 135 grs.^ 
 
 Passing westward let us try and learn something from the 
 early coinage of Italy. Unfortunately, with the exception of 
 
 1 Miinz- Mass- und Geioichtswesen in Vorderasien, p. 80 seqq. 
 ' Lenormant, La Monnaie dans I'Antiquite, i. 103 seqq. 
 3 Metrol?, p. 375. 
 * Horapollo, i. 11, Ilap' AlyvTrrlois ixovas imv al Sio Spaxf^al. 
 
 R. 9 
 
130 THE GOLD UNIT EVERYWHERE 
 
 the Greek cities of Magna Graecia, all Italian mintages are of 
 a comparatively late date. The Etruscans were probably the 
 first of the non-Hellenic inhabitants to coin money, but un- 
 happily their gold coins are of rather uncertain date. How- 
 ever, it is worth noticing that these coins are probably thirds, 
 sixths and twelfths of the unit 130-5 grains, the weights 
 respectively being 44grs., 22grs., 11 grs. This view borrows 
 considerable additional probability from the fact that the silver 
 coins with plain reverses, which very possibly belong to the same 
 age as the earlier gold, are struck on the standard of 135 grains. 
 Whilst in the latter case the Etruscans can be said to have 
 struck their coins on the Euboic-Syracusan, or Attic-Syracusan, 
 or Euboic-Attic standard which was in use at Syracuse, it 
 cannot be so alleged with respect to their gold. For not 
 only are the subdivisions of the unit unknown to the Attic or 
 Syracusan gold, but the coins bear numerals, /I = 50, AXX 
 = 25, XII< = 12^, X=10, which are found respectively on 
 the coins of 44, 22, 11 and 9 grains, while on others again which 
 weigh 18 grains we find the numeral A = 5 grains'. Here then 
 we have clear indications of a native Etruscan gold currency, 
 existing prior to Greek influence and able to hold its own when 
 the art of coining, and the very coin types themselves, were 
 borrowed from the Greeks. 
 
 The Carthaginians were the close allies of the Etruscans 
 in the struggle . for the maritime supremacy of the Western 
 Mediterranean against the Greeks, especially the bold Phocaeans, 
 who gained over the fleet of both peoples a " Cadmean victory " 
 at Alalia in Corsica (537 B.C.). 
 
 The first Carthaginian coinage was issued in the Sicilian 
 cities, especially Panormus, at a comparatively late date, cer- 
 tainly not earlier than 410 B.C. As this coinage was entirely 
 under Greek influences of comparatively late date, we cannot of 
 course get any direct evidence from it as regards the original 
 Phoenician standard. Carthage herself did not issue coins 
 until about a century later, B.C. 310^. Hence we have no 
 data of an early date. The gold coins struck in Sicily are 
 
 1 Deeoke, Etnisk. Forsch. ii. p. 1. Head, Op. cit. p. 12, 
 " Head, Op. cit. p. 747. 
 
THE VALUE OF A COW. 131 
 
 didrachms of about 120 grains troy, with various subdivisions. 
 This is usually described as the Phoenician standard, or rather 
 the Phoenician gold standard of 260 grains considerably reduced. 
 But the full unit of 240 is never found in the coins, and 
 although we get coins of 2^ drachms (= 147 grains), it is more 
 natural to regard the didrachm of about 120 grains as the real 
 unit, in other words the slightly lowered common unit, which we 
 already found fixed at about 127 grains in the Egyptian rings. 
 In Sicily and Magna Graecia w« are fairly certain that the unit 
 was in early times that of 130 gi'ains. But whether this was 
 native or brought in by the Greek colonists, it is impossible to 
 prove. All that we know for certain is that there was in Sicily 
 and Magna Graecia, a small talent used only for gold; which 
 was equivalent to three Attic gold staters, or in other words the 
 threefold of our Homeric ox-unit. Thus an ancient writer says 
 "the Sicilian talent had a very small weight; the ancient one, 
 as Aristotle says, 24 nummi, the later 12 nummi. But the 
 niimmus weighs three half oboist" From this it is plain that 
 the ancient form of this talent weighed 36 obols, that is, six 
 drachms, or three staters. 
 
 Lastly, let us glance at those peoples who lay between 
 Northern Italy and the Bay of Biscay. Although we have no 
 direct evidence as to the unit by which the Gauls reckoned 
 that gold of which, as we saw above, they had great store, 
 before they came under the influence of either Phoenician, 
 Greek, or Italian, we can perhaps make a justifiable inference 
 from the fact that when the Gauls proceeded to strike gold coins 
 in imitation of the gold stater of Philip of Macedon, they did 
 not, as might have been expected, follow also the weight unit 
 (135 grs.) of that coin. For as a matter of fact scarcely any of 
 the Gaulish imitations exceed 120 grains troy^. It would appear 
 then that the Gauls had already at that time a gold unit in 
 use, somewhat lighter than the usual weight of our "ox-unit," 
 although we cannot of course ignore the possibility of its being 
 
 ' To nivToi 'ZiKcKiKov ToKavTov i\axt<rTov taxvai, rb iihi Apxaiov, us ' kpuTToriXris 
 \^et rhrapai Kal etKOCi rods vo^fip-ovs rh 5^ vffrepov dvoKaiSeKa, dOvaadax d^ rbv 
 voOft/iov rpla i)/iiw;86Xio. (Hultseh, Reliq. Metrol. Scrip. 300.) 
 
 2 Of, Hucher, L'Art Gaulois, p. 19 and PI. I. 
 
 9—2 
 
132 
 
 THE GOLD UNIT EVERYWHERE 
 
 the form of the Phoenician gold standard, which we found above 
 was employed by the Carthaginians both in Sicily and Africa; 
 in other words it may be maintained that the Gauls followed 
 the standard on which the Phocaeans of Massalia struck their 
 silver coinage. As, however, the coins of Massalia were drachms 
 of about 55 grains the probability is not very high that the 
 Gauls had no gold standard of their own for gold until they got 
 one from the silver of Marseilles. 
 
 The Teutonic tribes who likewise issued imitations of the 
 Philippus also followed a standard of 120 grs. for coins, from 
 which it is likely that they as well as the Gauls employed a unit 
 of 120 grs. for gold before they ever began to strike money. 
 
 We have now taken a survey of the most ancient gold 
 standards we can find throughout the wide regions through 
 which the common system of weights of after years prevailed, 
 extending in our range from the heart of Asia to the shores of 
 the Atlantic. 
 
 Our results will best be seen in the following table : 
 
 Egyptian gold ring standard . 
 
 Mycenaean .... 
 
 Homeric talent (or "Ox-unit") 
 
 Attic gold stater (the sole standard 
 
 Thasos . 
 
 Rhodes . 
 
 Cyzicus 
 
 Hebrew standard 
 
 Persian Daric 
 
 Macedonian stater 
 
 Bactrian stater 
 
 Indian standard (7th cent. A.D.) 
 
 Phoenician gold unit (double) 
 
 Carthaginian 
 
 Sicily and Lower Italy 
 
 Etruscan 
 
 Gaulish unit . 
 
 German 
 
 for gold) 
 
 Grains. 
 
 127 
 
 130—5 
 
 130—5 
 
 135 
 
 135 
 
 1.35 
 
 130 
 
 130 
 
 130 
 
 135 
 
 130—2 
 
 140 
 
 260 
 
 120 
 
 130—5 
 
 130—5 
 
 120 
 
 120 
 
THE VALUE OF A COW. 133 
 
 A glance at the table will suffice to show the truth of the 
 proposition which we laid down as the object of this chapter, 
 viz., that over the whole of the area with which we are dealing, 
 the same unit with but little variations and fluctuations was 
 employed for the weighing of gold. 
 
 Having proved the universal employment of the ox as a 
 chief unit of barter, the universal distribution of gold, the 
 priority of that metal both in discovery and in being weighed, 
 and finally, in the preceding pages, the remarkable fact that 
 to all intents and purposes the same unit of weight during 
 many centuries was employed in its appraising, we advance to 
 our next proposition, that this uniformity of the gold unit is 
 due to the fact that in all the various countries where we have 
 found it, it originally represented the value in gold of the cow, 
 the universal unit of barter in the same regions. 
 
 It will of course be hardly possible for us to find data for 
 a direct proof that in all the countries given in our table as 
 employing the gold unit, that unit really represented the value 
 of the ox. In some cases we shall be able to produce a fair 
 amount of evidence more or less direct, whilst in others owing 
 to the necessity of the case the evidence will be almost wholly 
 inferential. Finally we shall be able to bring forward a very 
 cogent form of proof by demonstrating the absolute necessity 
 felt by barbarous persons of equating a ready made weigbt 
 standard, which is being taken over from their neighbours, to 
 the older unit of barter, and likewise the necessity felt by semi- 
 civilized peoples under certain circumstances, even when long 
 accustomed to the use of coined money, of returning to the 
 animal unit as a means of fixing the standard of their coinage. 
 
 Starting first with the Greeks, we have already seen at an 
 early stage in this work that the talent of the Homeric Poems 
 was the equivalent of the ox, the older barter name being as yet 
 the only term used in expressing prices of commodities, and the 
 term talent being confined to the small piece of gold. 
 
 Passing next to the Italian Peninsula and Sicily, although 
 possessed of certain definite statements as regards the value in 
 copper of an ox in the fifth century B.C., nevertheless, owing to 
 the uncertainty which still exists as regards the relative value 
 
134 THE GOLD UNIT EVERYWHERE 
 
 of gold, silver and copper at Rome, we shall encounter consider- 
 able obstacles in our attempt to find the value of an ox in gold. 
 
 As Dr Theodore Mommsen' has laid down certain proposi- 
 tions in reference to inter-relations in value of the metals at 
 Rome, which were generally received until a very recent period, 
 when Mr Soutzo", in a clever brochure, put forward views of a 
 widely different character which have met with the approval 
 of some competent critics, and as the matter is still suh judice, 
 I think it best, after briefly giving the historical evidence for 
 the value of cattle, to give the views of both these writers. 
 
 The Law known as Atemia Tarpeia (451 B.C.) dealt with 
 questions of penalties; certain notices of it fortunately pre- 
 serve for us some valuable material. Cicero^ says, "Likewise 
 popular was the measure brought forward at the Comitia 
 Centuriata in the fifty-fourth year after the first consuls (451 
 B.C.) by the consuls Sp. Tarpeius and A. Atemius concerning 
 the amount of the penalty." To the same law Dionysius of 
 Halicamassus refers": "They ratified a law in the Centuriate 
 Assembly in order that all the magistrates might have the power 
 of inflicting punishment on those who were disorderly or acted 
 illegally in reference to their own jurisdiction. For till then 
 not all the magistrates had the power, but only the Consuls. 
 But they did not leave the penalty in their own hands to fix as 
 much as they pleased, but they themselves defined the amount, 
 having appointed as a maximum limit of penalty two oxen and 
 thirty sheep. And this law continued to be kept in force by 
 the Romans for a long time." Festus (s. v. Peculatus p. 237 ed. 
 Miiller) says: "Peculation (peculatus), as a name for public 
 theft, was derived from pectts 'cattle,' because that was the 
 earliest kind of fraud, and before the coining of copper or silver 
 the heaviest penalty for crimes was one of two sheep and thirty 
 oxen. That law was enacted by the Consuls T. Menenius 
 Lanatus and P. Sestius Capitolinus. As regards which cattle, 
 after the Roman people began to use coined money, it was 
 
 ' Histoire de la Monnaie Romaine, i. 236. 
 '■' Etude des Monnaies de Vltalie antique. 
 » De Rei>. ii. 35, 60. 
 •> i. 50. 
 
THE VALUE OF A COW. 135 
 
 provided by the Tarpeiaii Law that an ox should be reckoned at 
 100 asses, a sheep at 10 asses." 
 
 Again Aulus Gellius' has a curious notice, too long to quote 
 in full, which ends "on that account afterwards by the Aternian 
 Law ten asses were appointed for each sheep, one hundred for 
 each ox." 
 
 Cicero and Dionysius are probably right (as Niebuhr thinks) 
 in saying that Tarpeius and Atemius fixed the number of 
 animals. C. Julius and P. Papinius, who were Consuls in 
 429 B.C., to whose reckoning of fines (aestimatio multarum) 
 Livy refers (iv. 30), probably changed the penalties in cattle 
 into money equivalents. Festus and Gellius have evidently 
 muddled their authorities, having interchanged the words sheep 
 (ovium) and cows (bovum). But the important thing is that 
 both are agreed in giving the value of the cow at 100 asses. 
 
 Now Dr Hultsch (Metrologie^, 19. 3), following Mommsen, 
 shows that gold being to silver as 12^ : 1, the small talent, 
 called the Sicilian, of which we have just spoken, confined 
 exclusively to gold, would be exactly equivalent to a Roman 
 pound of silver (135 x 3 x 12^ = 5062 grains of silver; whilst 
 the Roman lb. = 5040 grs.). Since at Rome, previous to the 
 reduction of the As in 268 B.C., a Scripulum of silver was 
 equivalent to a pound of copper or as lihralis, and there are 
 288 Scripula or scruples in the pound, it follows that the pound 
 of silver or its equivalent the Sicilian gold talent was worth 288 
 asses librales. This gold talent = 3 Attic staters (or ox-units), 
 therefore 1 Attic stater = 96 asses librales. But we learned from 
 Festus and Gellius that the value of the cow fixed in 429 B.C. 
 was 100 asses. From this it appears that the value of the ox 
 on Italian soil at this period was almost exactly the same as 
 the traditional value which it had in the Homeric Poems, and 
 which it continued to have in the Delian sacrifices in later 
 times. The mere difference between 96 and 100 asses calls for 
 no elaborate comment. It is enough to remark after Hultsch, 
 that the further we go back the cheaper copper appears to be 
 in relation to silver. This fact will easily explain any dis- 
 
 1 Aulus Gellius, xi. 1. 2. 3 ; Plutarch, Poplic. 11, says a cow = 100 d^oXoi, a 
 sheep 10 (5/3oXo(. 
 
136 THE GOLD UNIT EVERYWHERE 
 
 crepaucy. Thus Mommsen's view that silver was to copper as 
 288 : 1 gives us a most interesting result. 
 
 Let us now turn to Mr Soutzo's view on the same subject. 
 He maintains that at no time was the relation between silver 
 and copper greater than 120 : 1, basing his argument on the 
 assumption (which we shall find to be against the statements 
 of the ancient writers) that when the iirst silver denarius or 
 10-as piece was coined in 268 B.C., as the as at that time 
 weighed only two unciae, or one-sixth of a pound, silver was to 
 copper as 120 : 1. He also argues from the fact that in Egypt, 
 under the Ptolemies, the same relations existed between silver 
 and bronze. He likewise maintaias that the relation between 
 gold and silver in Italy and Sicily at this period was as 16 : 1, 
 from which it follows that gold was to copper as 1920 : 1. 
 This of course gives us as the value of a cow about 390 
 grains of gold, that is about three gold staters, or ox-units. 
 We would certainly be able to prove that at no time or place 
 in the ancient world was a cow of so great a value in gold. 
 
 I shall refrain from any discussion of the merits of either 
 view for the present. I will only add one observation : Mr 
 Soutzo (p. 17) regards the Italian weight standards as borrowed 
 from the East, and starts with bronze as the earliest stage in 
 the history of the weights. The only clearly defined unit of 
 Roman growth according to him is the Centupondium, which 
 he says is the same as the Assyrian talent. From this the 
 Romans obtained their own libra or pound by dividing their 
 talents into 100 parts instead of 60. We shall find hereafter 
 that this is an untenable position, but meantime it is inter- 
 esting to find the Centupondium, or sum of 100 asses taken by 
 an unprejudiced writer as the basis of the Roman system in the 
 light of the fact that the ancient Roman value of the cow is 
 likewise 100 asses. If Mr Soutzo was right, our thesis finds 
 complete support, as it would plainly appear in that case that, 
 although the Italians received their weight-unit ready made, 
 they found it nevertheless necessary to equate the new metallic 
 unit so obtained to the cow, the older unit of barter. 
 
 In Sicily we have an opportunity not merely of finding the 
 approximate value of a cow in gold without having to deal 
 
THE VALUE OF A COW. 137 
 
 with the disturbing question of the relative value of copper 
 and silver, but also of showing that Soutzo's relation of 120 : 1 
 as that between silver and copper in early Italy must certainly 
 be wrong, and that Mommsen's view is in the main correct. 
 The famous Sicilian poet Epicharmus has left us a line : " Buy 
 me straightway a nice heifer calf for ten nomoi^." As regards 
 the value of the nomos, or nummus {v6fw<; or vovfifio'i), Pollux 
 supplies us with some definite information. 
 
 In passage (ix. 87) already quoted he says: "Yet the 
 Sicilian talent was the least in amount, the ancient one, as 
 Aristotle says, weighed four and twenty nummi, but the later 
 one twelve ; now the nummus is worth three half obols." These 
 three half obols plainly mean the ordinary half obols of the 
 Attic standard. As the Attic drachm is 67| grains (normal), 
 65 grains in actual coins, the ^ or obol = ll grains roughly 
 speaking; three half obols therefore weigh 16 J to 17 grains. 
 Accordingly, if we take the weight of the nummus or litra at 
 16 to 17 grains of silver, we shall not be wide of the mark. The 
 price then of a good heifer calf was 10 nummi or 160 to 170 
 grains of silver. The term moschos (calf) is used rather vaguely 
 by various Greek writers, but fortunately by the aid of the Sicilian 
 poet Theocritus, we are certain that it means a calf of the 
 first year not yet weaned; for he speaks^ of putting the mos- 
 chos to the cows to suck. From what we have seen (p. 32) of 
 the relative values of cattle of different ages, it is tolerably 
 certain that no full-grown cow would be worth less than six 
 or more than ten calves of the first year. Hence the Sicilian 
 cow, at the end of the sixth century B.C., must have been worth 
 from 960 — 1020 to 1600—1700 grains of silver. We cannot 
 tell exactly what was the ratio between gold and silver in 
 Sicily or Italy at this time, but as we find it was 14 to 1 in 
 Attica in 440 B.C., the probability is that it was not very far 
 from that in Sicily. It certainly must have been at some 
 point between 15:1 and 12:1. Taking it at 12 : 1, the value 
 of the cow would range from 80 to 141f grains of gold, whilst 
 in the ratio of 15:1 the range is from 64 to 113 grains of 
 
 ^ Pollux, IX, 80, cidOt irptw ixoi dexa m/uoy notrxov KoKav. 
 ^ Theocr. ix. 3, //.oaxus /Souo-ic iitpivTes. 
 
138 THE GOLD UNIT EVERYWHERE 
 
 gold. It is thus absolutely certain that the value of a cow in 
 Sicily in the sixth century B.C. must lie within the limits of ■ 64 
 to 141 grains, and if the calf of Epicharmus is a suckling, the 
 range in the value of the cow must be from 113 to 140 grains. 
 This is all we require for practical purposes, and it will be 
 admitted that the value of a cow in Sicily comes very close to 
 our Homeric ox-unit of 130 — 5 grains. 
 
 We are now in a position to test the truth of Mr Soutzo's 
 hypothesis. It will be conceded that at the beginning of the 
 fifth century B.C., the cow must have had about the same value 
 both in Italy and Sicily. The cow in Italy was worth 100 
 Eoman pounds of copper, in Sicily about 1650 grains of silver. 
 If Soutzo is right in saying that silver was to copper as 120 : 1 
 on multiplying 1650 by 120 we ought to get a result in copper 
 corresponding to 100 Roman pounds: 1650 x 120 = 198000. 
 Taking the Roman pound before it was raised at about 5000 grs. 
 
 the Sicilian cow was worth 39 pounds of copper ( . = 39j. 
 
 It is absurd to suppose that even at any time the Italian cow 
 could have been worth 2^ times the Sicilian. Let us now apply 
 the same test to Mommsen's doctrine, and multiply 1650 grs. of 
 silver by 300. (I take this as being more likely than 288 to have 
 been the relation between copper and silver in the fifth century 
 B.C.). 1650 X 300 = 495000 -=- 5000 = 99 pounds of copper. The 
 result is too striking to admit of our coming to any other 
 conclusion than that Mommsen is right. 
 
 Next let us examine his doctrine that in ancient Italy gold 
 was to silver as 16 : 1. Mr Soutzo' supports this view by three 
 arguments: (1) that when Rome in the course of the Second 
 Punic War issued gold coins for the first time, gold was to 
 silver as 16 : 1 ; (2) Mr Head^ has shown that at Syracuse under 
 
 1 Mr Head {Coinage of Syracuse], Numismat. Chronicle, New Series, Vol. 
 XIV., thinks that under Dionysius the Elder (406—367 b.c.) and his successors 
 gold was to silver as 15 : 1 at Syracuse, whilst in the time of Agathocles (317— 
 289 B.C.) it was as 12 : 1. We can however hardly take the evidence of the coin 
 weights as sufficient, when we consider the extraordinary devices to which 
 Dionysius resorted to raise money, causing coins of tin to pass as silver, making 
 the silver coins hear a double value etc. as is related by Aristotle, Oeconomica, ii. 21. 
 
 2 Oj). cit. 26. 
 
THE VALUE OF A COW. 139 
 
 the despot Uionysius (-iOo — 345 B.C.) gold was to silver as 
 15:1 ; (3) that certain symbols on the gold coins of Etruria 
 when interpreted as referring to silver litrae give the pro- 
 portion between the metals as 16 : 1. The same answer can 
 dispose of the first two arguments. The state of affairs both at 
 Rome in B.C. 207, and at Syracuse under Dionysius, was quite 
 exceptional. Rome was in a state of bankruptcy, her subjects 
 largely in revolt, the Lex Oppia (215 B.C.) prevented women 
 from wearing more than half an ounce of gold ornaments'. It 
 is therefore irrational to treat as normal the relation found to 
 exist between the metals at such a crisis. 
 
 Similarly at Syracuse the relations between the metals were 
 completely upset by the wild conduct of Dionysius, who forced 
 his subjects to take coins of tin at the same rate as though 
 they were silver. Moreover any evidence to be drawn with 
 reference to the ratio between silver and gold at Syracuse in 
 the time of Dionysius is completely nullified by the fact that 
 in the reign of Agathocles (B.C. 307) gold was to silver as 12 : l^ 
 It is evident therefore that if in 207 B.C. gold was to silver all 
 over Italy as 16 : 1, there must have been a great appreciation 
 of gold. Are we not then justified in regarding the ratio of 
 16 : 1 as exceptional, and that of 12 : 1 as the more regular? 
 That great fluctuations in the relations of the metals did 
 take place in Italy, we know from a statement of Polybius 
 that in his own time in consequence of the great output 
 of gold from a- mine in Noricum gold went down one-third in 
 value. Silver was scarce in Central Italy, for it was only after 
 the conquest of Magna Graecia that Rome found herself in a 
 position to issue a silver currency. On the other hand there 
 must have been a large and constant supply of gold coming 
 down from the gold-fields of the Alps in exchange for the bronze 
 wares of Etruria. Now as at Athens, where silver was so plenty 
 and gold in earlier days scarce, the ratio was never higher than 
 15 : 1, it is impossible to suppose that in Northern and Central 
 Italy, where the conditions were contrariwise, the ratio can ever 
 have been in ordinary times higher than 12 : 1. 
 
 ^ Livy XXXIV. 1. Valer. Max. 9. 1. 3. 
 ^ Head, Op.cit. 160. 
 
140 THE GOLD UNIT EVERYWHERE 
 
 It is quite possible that after the Gauls got possession of 
 Northern Italy, the supply of gold which reached Etruria and 
 Latium may have been considerably reduced, and this would 
 perfectly explain the relation existing at a certain period be- 
 tween gold and silver coins in Etruria, supposing that Soutzo's 
 interpretation of the symbols is correct. But as we have no 
 literary evidence to check off any deductions drawn from the 
 coins, it is impossible for us to say whether the symbols on the 
 gold pieces refer to units of silver or bronze. 
 
 Returning to the Kelts, the close kinsfolk of the Italians, 
 the reader will recollect that the Gauls struck their imitations 
 of the stater of Philip of Macedon on a standard of 120 grs., 
 15 grains lower than the weight of the archetype. Now similar 
 but still more barbarous imitations of Philip's gold stater are 
 found in Germany. These Rainbow dishes (Regenbogen- 
 
 .'^."C^-j.-*. 
 
 Fig. 20. " Eegenbogenschhssel " 
 (ancient German imitation of the Stater of Philip of Maoedon). 
 
 schiisseln), as they are popularly termed in allusion to the pic- 
 turesque superstition that a treasure of gold lies at the foot of the 
 rainbow, and also to their scyphate form, are found in especial 
 abundance in Rhenish Bavaria and Bohemia. Like the Gaulish 
 imitations of the Philippus from which they are copied, they 
 follow a standard of 120 grs. (and like the Gauls the Germans 
 struck quarters of this coin, a division wholly unknown to the 
 Greeks)'. In the region just indicated dwelt the ancient 
 Alamanni, and there can be no doubt that it was this people 
 who issued the coins found there. Now the Alamanni were 
 among the barbarians who after having overrun the provinces 
 of the Roman Empire, committed to barbarous Latin their 
 immemorial laws and institutions. In the Laws of the Ala- 
 
 1 Mommsen (Blacas), Histoive de la Monnaie romaine, m. 275. 
 
THE VALUE OF A COW. 141 
 
 manni the best ox is estimated at five tremisses^, that is 1| solidi, 
 or in other words 120grs. of gold, the medium ox = 4 tremisses 
 = 96 grs. The coincidence that the value of the ox in gold is 
 the actual weight of the coins of the Alamanni is too striking 
 to admit of any other explanation than that the gold coins of 
 this people were struck on the native standard, the ox-unit. 
 The Keltic and Teutonic tribes were so intermixed that we 
 may plausibly infer that the Gauls had reduced the weight of 
 the Philippus to 120 grs. because owing to gold being less 
 plentiful and cattle more abundant to the north of the Alps, 
 from a very remote time the ox-unit throughout Gaul and 
 Germany was slightly lower than along the Mediterranean. 
 
 In the Laws of the Burgundians the value of an ox is set at 
 2 solidi = 144 grs. of gold^ This of course is considerably more 
 than that 'of the Alamannic ox, but when we consider the late 
 period at which the laws of the Barbarians were compiled, and 
 the various recensions which they underwent, the strange fact 
 is that the ox should have varied so little in its relation to gold 
 from the Homeric ox-unit of at least 1000 B.C. 
 
 Passing into Scandinavia we once more, even so late as the 
 eighth century A.D., find the same strange agreement in value. 
 In the ancient Norse documents (where the cow is the unit 
 of value as we have already seen) it is reckoned at 2^ ores 
 (ounces) of silver = 1078 grains. But we likewise know from 
 the same sources that gold stood to silver as 8:1; accordingly 
 the cow was worth 134 grs. of gold^ 
 
 Besides the Hellenes and Italians there was another people 
 who strove for the mastery of all the Western Mediterranean. 
 The ancient city of Tyre had sent out many colonies into the 
 far West, when the nascent power of Hellas had already begun 
 to assert its superiority in the Aegean. Trade grew and flour- 
 ished between the colonies and the mother city in Phoenicia; 
 thus there was unbroken intercourse between remote Gades 
 and her Eastern mother until after the destruction of the latter 
 
 ' Pertz, Monumenta Historica Germaniae, Vol. iii. Lex Alamannorum, lib. 
 sec. Lxxx. summus bovis 5 tremisses valet celt. 
 
 2 Pertz, Op. cit. Leges Burgimdiorum, p. 534 : pro bove solidos 2 eett. 
 " Sohive and Holmboe, Norges Mynter (Christiania, 1865), pp. i — iv. 
 
142 THE GOLD UNIT EVEKY WHERE 
 
 (720 B.C.). Henceforward the headship of the Phoenician cities 
 of the West falls into the hands of Carthage, the scene of the 
 last great act and final catastrophe in the drama of Phoenician 
 history. At the very time, nay some say on the ver}' day, when 
 the Greeks of the East were destroying the host of Xerxes in 
 the Strait of Salamis, the Hellenes of the West led by brave 
 Gelon of Syracusfcwere repelling a great army of Carthaginians 
 before the walls of Himera, and during the third and fourth 
 centuries B.C. the Greeks of Sicily lived in constant danger from 
 the Carthaginians, who held the western part of the island with 
 their factories of Lilybaeum, Drepanum and Motye, until at last 
 they were finally expelled from the island by the resistless 
 might of Rome (241 B.C.). 
 
 Could we but learn the estimate put upon the ox by the 
 Phoenicians or Carthaginians, we would get a fair index to its 
 value over a wide extended area. For as in earlier times the 
 Phoenician influence extended from Tyre to Gades, linking both 
 east and west, so in later days Carthage extended her power 
 over all North Africa from the Pillars of Herakles to the 
 confines of Egypt, and over Southern Spain. 
 
 Some forty years ago the longest Phoenician inscription yet 
 known was found at Marseilles. The inscription seems to have 
 belonged to a temple of Baal, and contains directions touching 
 sacrifices and certain payments to be made to the officiating 
 priest. Chemical analysis of the stone has demonstrated that it 
 is of a kind not found in France, but known in North Africa. 
 Hence M. Renan thought that it had been brought as ballast in 
 some ship. The names of two Suffetes stand at the head of the 
 inscription, which seems along with other evidence to point to 
 its having been engraved at Carthage. On palaeographical 
 grounds its date is placed in the fourth century B.C., but why it 
 came to Massalia seems still inexplicable. It is possible that in 
 the fourth century B.C. there was a considerable body of Cartha- 
 ginians resident at Massalia, just as on the other hand we know 
 that there was a large Greek community residing at Carthage. 
 If that were so, the Carthaginians would naturally keep up the 
 worship of Baal at Marseilles, and would regulate the temple 
 worship in accordance with the practice of the mother city. The 
 
THE VALUE OF A COW. 143 
 
 stone in that case may have been imported to serve as an official 
 declaration of the rules to be observed in sacrifices. Movers and 
 Kenrick regarded the sums of money named in connection with 
 the victims as composition for the animals named, whilst the 
 editors of the Corpus Inscriptionum Semiticarum (Vol. i. Pt. i. 
 p. 217) regard them as fees to be paid to the priests for the 
 performance of the sacrifices, saying that it is analogous to the 
 directions for the burnt offerings, peace offerings and thank 
 offerings contained in Leviticus i — vii. The few lines of the 
 inscription with which we are concerned I shall translate from 
 the Latin version given in the Corpus. 
 
 " Concerning an ox, whether it is a whole burnt offering, or 
 deprecatory offering or a thank offering, there shall be to the 
 priests ten shekels of silver, and if it is a whole burnt offering, 
 in addition to the fees this weight of flesh, three hundred; and 
 if it is a peace offering the first cuts and additions, the ap- 
 purtenances thereof, and the skin and the entrails, carcase and 
 the feet, and the rest of the flesh shall belong to the giver of 
 the sacrifice. 
 
 " Concerning the calf without horns, concerning an animal 
 which is not castrated, or a ram, whether it is a whole burnt 
 offering, or a peace offering, or a thank offering, there shall be 
 to the priests five shekels of silver, and if it be a whole burnt 
 offering in addition to the fee this weight of flesh, one hundred 
 and fifty. 
 
 " Concerning a he-goat or a she-goat, whether it is a whole 
 burnt offering, etc. there shall be to the priest one shekel of 
 silver two zer. 
 
 " Concerning a sheep or kid or goat, whether it is etc., there 
 shall be etc. | shekel one [zer] of silver. 
 
 " Concerning a tame bird, or wild bird, f shekel and two 
 zer." 
 
 Let me here remark that in Leviticus there is no mention 
 whatsoever made of any fees to the priest, also that whilst 
 according to the above version the giver of the victim gets the 
 skin, in Leviticus (vii. 8) it is the priest who gets it as his 
 perquisite, as seems also to have been the practice in Greece. 
 For we know that the Spartan kings, who in their capacity of 
 
144 THE GOLD UNIT EVERY WHEKE 
 
 priests offered all sacrifices at Sparta, always got the skins as 
 their payment^ That the sums mentioned are really the prices 
 of the victims is made almost certain by the fact that at the 
 famous Phoenician temple of Aphrodite at Eryx in Sicily the 
 victims were kept ready by the priests to be sold to worshippers 
 who wished to sacrifice, as we know from a curious story told 
 by Aelian^. 
 
 Whilst it would be of great importance for my purpose 
 to have been able to regard the sums mentioned in the in- 
 scription as the actual value set upon the animals, even if we 
 simply regard them as fees they still give us some aid. For 
 as it is most unlikely that the fee for sacrificing would exceed 
 the value of the victim to be sacrificed, we thus can obtain a 
 minimum limit of value. We may then safely assume that the 
 value of the ox was not less than 10 shekels of silver. On the 
 other hand we shall find from Exodus what must have been 
 the maximum value among the Hebrews at a comparatively 
 late date. As the Punic ox cannot have been worth less than 
 1350 grs. of silver, and the Hebrew not more than 1760 grs., 
 it is almost certain that the value of the ox at Carthage lay 
 between these limits. 
 
 The pieces of silver mentioned in the inscription are 
 probably ordinary silver didrachms of the Attic standard. The 
 Carthaginians had coined silver in Sicily on the Attic standard 
 from about 410 B.C., but issued no silver coins at Carthage itself 
 until after the acquisition of the Spanish Silver Mines (241 B.C.), 
 although gold, electrum, and bronze coins were minted. In 
 Greece Proper in the 4th century B.C. gold was to silver as 
 10:1; we may therefore not be far wrong if we assume a 
 
 1 Herod, vi. 57. See evidence of this collected by Stengel, Die griechisehe 
 Sakralalterttimer, pp. 29 sq. 81 sq. (Iwau Miiller's Handbuch, Vol. v. pt. iii.) 
 
 ^ Hist. Animal, x. 50, rd ye fi-^v Upeia eKdaTrjs dy4\7]s airdfiara (poiT^ Kal Ti^ 
 ^uij,(fi Trap^o-Tij/cec, dyei di dpa aird Tpumj piv i] 6£6s, elra r] dtivap.is re Kal ij toC 
 ffiovTos §oi\ri(ns. d 70CV iSeXois 6S<Tai olc, ISoi croi t$' ^lo/ii} irap4<rTriK€v oh, Kal 
 Set x^P''^^"' Kardp^aaBai.' cl Si eiT/s tui/ dhporipuiv Kal ^WXois 6v(rai ^oSv BijKeiav rj 
 Kal ^Tt TrXeiom, eTra {jirip ttJs rt/A^s oiire ai 6 vofieiis iTtTLfiijiv ^K^fxuhffH oihe aij 
 XuTTiJireis iKeivov • rb ydp SUaiov t^s Trpd(reois ii debs i<popf. Kal eu KaraSels 'IXewv 
 l^eis ain-^v el di ide\ois tou SeovTos ivplaaBai eireXeCTepov, (ri piv KaredriKas rb 
 dpyiptov dWojs, rb 5k ^(pov direpxerai, Kal dvcrat. oiiK ^x^'^* 
 
THE VALUE OF A COW. 145 
 
 similar ratio between the metals to have held at Carthage 
 about the same period. That silver was scarce is shown by the 
 fact that they did not coin it, although issuing gold, electruni 
 and bronze. Ten silver didrachms would therefore = 1 gold 
 didrachm of 135 grs., which is of course our ox-unit. This is a 
 remarkable result, and of itself would make one believe that 
 the sum represents the real value of an ox, which the practice 
 at Eryx puts beyond doubt. We know that at Athens the 
 people who were bound to provide the public sacrifices supplied 
 very wretched oxen, so we need not be surprised to find pre- 
 cautions taken by the priests of Baal to ensure that proper 
 animals should be provided for the altar, especially as they 
 themselves got a share of the flesh. 
 
 Next let us see if that most ancient of all known civilized 
 lands, Egypt, can produce from her store of monumental records 
 any evidence for our purpose. Professor Brugsch^, in his History 
 of Egypt under the Pharaohs, gives from inscriptions a list of 
 the prices of various commodities about 1000 «.C.: a slave cost 
 3 ten 1 ket of silver; an ox 1 ket of silver (= 8 ten of copper); 
 a goat cost 2 ten of copper ; 1 pair of fowls (geese ?) cost ^ ten 
 of copper ; 1 hotep of wheat cost 2 ten of copper ; 1 tena of 
 corn of Upper Egypt cost 5 — 7 ten of copper ; 1 hotep of spelt 
 2 ten of copper ; 1 hin of honey 8 ket of copper ; 50 acres of 
 arable land 5 ten of silver. Of course there must be more or 
 less uncertainty about some of these statements owing to the 
 imperfect knowledge which we as yet possess. At first sight 
 the reader naturally wonders how it is possible to calculate the 
 value of the ox as here given, which is only 1 ket of silver, 
 that is, the Egyptian ox of 1000 B.C. was only worth 140 
 grains of silver, whilst an ox hitherto has been worth about the 
 same amount in gold. At first sight this is enough to stagger 
 us, but a moment's reflection makes the matter very intelligible. 
 We have already noticed (p. 59) that at a certain stage in the 
 history of the metals silver was far scarcer than gold, and that 
 its rarity combined with its beauty no doubt made it to be 
 eagerly sought and held in great esteem. We saw that the 
 Arabs of the Soudan down to the present day prefer silver 
 1 Egypt under the Ptiaraohs (2nd edit. Engl, transl.), Vol. ii. p. 199. 
 R. 10 
 
146 THE GOLD UNIT EVERYWHERE 
 
 to gold; whilst in the earlier part of the present century 
 when Japan was opened to European commerce the Japanese 
 eagerly exchanged gold for silver at the rate of one to three, 
 and even less, as they possessed no native silver, and were 
 charmed with the beauty of the little known metal*. Marco 
 Polo also tells us that " in the province of Carajan (the modem 
 Yunnan) gold is so plenty that they give a saggio of gold for 
 only six of the same weight of silver;" and of the province of 
 Zardandao, five days west of Carajan, he says, "I can tell you 
 they give one weight of gold for only five of silver'." 
 
 It is almost certain that in all countries at one stage silver 
 must have been of higher value than gold; afterwards as its pro- 
 duction became greater, it became equal in value, and finally, 
 little by little, much less valuable, until at last the relation 
 between the metals is 1 : 22. Of course we must add that there 
 must have been always certain fluctuations, accordiag as a 
 sudden increase of output of one or other of the metals altered 
 temporarily their relations. We have evidence that silver in. 
 early times in Egypt was held in higher esteem than gold. 
 Thus Erman' says that according to ancient Egyptian notions 
 silver was the most costly of the precious metals ; for they 
 always in an enumeration mention it before gold, and in the 
 tombs ornaments of silver are of far rarer occurrence than those 
 of gold. This circumstance is simply and sufficiently explained 
 (thinks Erman) by the fact that Egypt herself possesses no 
 deposits of silver, but must have obtained the metal from 
 Cilicia. Under the 18th dynasty (1400 B.C.), the Phoenicians 
 supplied Egypt with silver and under the new empire the 
 supply had so increased that it was now evidently cheaper than 
 gold, for the later texts always name silver after gold, just as we 
 do. We have previously noticed the paucity of silver articles 
 in the tombs at Mycenae which are commonly dated 1400 B.C. 
 
 It is therefore reasonable to suppose that towards the end of 
 the Second Millennium B.C. gold and silver were almost of equal 
 value, not alone ia Egypt, but in other parts likewise of the 
 
 1 Sir Rutherford Aleook, The Capital of the Tycoon, i. 281. 
 
 2 Marco Polo, Yule's Transl. ii. pp. 62 and 70. 
 
 ^ Aegypten wnd agyptisches Leben in Alterthum, p. 611. 
 
THE VALUE OF A COW. 147 
 
 ancient world. The great supply of silver had not yet been 
 obtained which in the 10th century B.C. made silver at Jerusalem 
 like stones. "As for silver," says the sacred writer, "it was 
 nothing accounted of in the days of Solomon" (900 B.C.)', who 
 had "made silver and gold at Jerusalem as plenteous as stones '■'." 
 By this time silver had become very cheap in Egypt likewise. 
 At least if we can at all rely on the author of the books of 
 Chronicles. For the king's merchants " fetched up and brought 
 forth out of Egypt a chariot for six hundred shekels of silver, 
 and an horse for one hundred and fifty: and so brought they 
 out horses for all the kings of the Hittites and the kings of 
 Syrian" 
 
 The shekel here meant is probably that of 130 — 135 grains, 
 while the price of the ox in Brugsch's list is 1 ket or 140 grains. 
 At a moderate computation this would make a horse worth 150 
 oxen, if our documents were contemporary. But from lists of 
 relative prices in ancient and modem times it is preposterous to 
 suppose that at any time or in any place such a remarkable 
 difference in value existed between the horse and the cow. 
 From this it follows that if Brugsch is right in his translation of 
 his Egyptian text, the latter must date from several centuries 
 before 1000 B.C., when as yet silver was of the same or almost 
 the same value as gold. Finally, we have no means of knowing 
 the age of the ox, but as it is equal in value to only four goats, 
 it is possible that it was not a full-grown animal. I have dealt 
 with this point at some length, and have little positive gain to 
 show, but it is necessary to put before the reader all data which 
 may a,id in our search, and still more necessary to do so in the 
 case of evidence which seems to present serious difficulties. 
 
 Unfortunately for us the Old Testament gives very scanty 
 information on the question of the cost of various commodities, 
 and in no place do we get any information regarding the price 
 of cattle. For in the account of the purchase of the threshing- 
 floor and oxen of Oman the Jebusite by king David, there is 
 a discrepancy in price between the Second Book of Samuel 
 (xxiv. 24<) and First Chronicles (xxi. 25), the former making 
 
 1 1 Kings X. 21. 2 2 Chron. i. 15. 
 
 3 2 Chron. i. 17. 
 
 10—2 
 
148 THE GOLD UNIT EVERYWHERE 
 
 the sum 50 shekels of silver, the latter " six hundred shekels 
 of gold by weight," and in any case, as we do not know the 
 number of oxen used in threshing or the value of the floor and 
 threshing instruments, it is impossible for us to draw any in- 
 ference. In the Book of Exodus, however, we obtain the value 
 of a slave, from which we may at least get an approximate 
 idea of the value of an ox : " If the (wicked) ox shall push a 
 manservant or a maidservant; he (the owner of the ox) shall 
 give unto their master thirty shekels of silver, and the ox 
 shall be stoned" (xxi. 32). Here, as in the ancient laws of 
 Wales and elsewhere, the value of the male and female slave 
 is the same, and thirty shekels or pieces of silver seems to have 
 been the conventional price of a slave among the Hebrews. 
 To this Zechariah (xi. 12) seems to allude, " So they weighed 
 for my price thirty pieces of silver," in reference to which the 
 Evangelist writes : " Then was fulfilled that which was spoken 
 by Jeremy the prophet, saying. And they took the thirty pieces 
 of silver, the price of him that was valued, whom they of the 
 children of Israel did value " (Matt, xxvii. 9). The average 
 slave among the Homeric Greeks (as we saw above) was worth 
 about three oxen, amongst the Irish three, among the modern 
 Zulus about 10, and among the wild tribes of Annam seven 
 (pp. 24 — 5). Allowing three oxen as the value of a slave among 
 the Hebrews, the ox is worth 10 shekels (ancient) = 1300 
 grains of silver = 130 grains of gold, taking gold to silver as 
 10:1, which at an early period was probably the regular ratio 
 in parts of Asia Minor. The result thus reached gives us once 
 more the Homeric ox-unit as the value of the Hebrew ox. It is 
 certain that it cannot have been higher, although we cannot 
 show that it may not have been less. 
 
 The cow is estimated in the Commentary on Vendidad, 
 Fargard, IV. 1 — 2 at 12 stirs or istirs. 
 
 Our task must be now to find out the weight of this istir. 
 Istir or stir is identified with Greek a-rarijp (as dirham is with 
 Greek Spa^^jjui^). 
 
 The Pahlavi Texts, translated by Dr West, naturally aiford 
 us the readiest means of discovering our object'. 
 
 1 Sacred Books of the East, Vols, v., xviii., and xxiv. 
 
THE VALUE OF A COW. 
 
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150 THE GOLD UNIT EVERYWHERE 
 
 There are in the Shayast-la-Shayast various lists of sins and 
 good works. These sins or good works are put in the golden 
 balance and weighed, in which case the stir is a weight, whilst 
 in other cases we have a money evaluation. As much con- 
 fusion arises from variations in the lists, it will be best to tabu- 
 late the different lists, and thus get a synoptic view of the 
 whole. 
 
 On looking at the table, we find 'that all our authorities 
 are in complete harmony as to the amounts of the last five ; 
 Aredus is 30 stirs, Kh6r = 60, BazM = 90, Y^t = 180, and Tana- 
 piihar = 300 stirs. Let us first consider these. We must re- 
 member that on the third night after death the soul is judged 
 by having its sins and good works weighed, and according as 
 the one or other predominates, is the ultimate destiny of the 
 soul foul or fair. It is thus essentially a scale of weights, not 
 of coins. The arrangement of the numbers at once speaks for 
 itself. 30 stirs = J Tnina on the Babylonian system, as will be 
 seen on p. 251. 60 stirs (Khdr) = 1 mina, 90 stirs (B4zai) = 1| 
 minae, 180 (Yat) = 3 minae, and finally we get 300 stirs (Tana- 
 puhar) = 5 minae. What then is the weight of the stir ? It is 
 none other than the light Babylonian shekel (130 grains Troy). 
 
 Now let us approach the bewildering tangle of the first four 
 degrees. It is evident that there are mistakes of numerals in 
 some cases, e.g. in Column I., where the Agerept and Avoirist 
 are made equal, both being only ^ of the first degree or 
 Farman, and also in Col. II. we have the Agerept greater than 
 the Avoirist and Aredus. But in Columns ill. iv. and V. we 
 get some elements of regularity. Two of them at least intro- 
 duce coined money, thus giving us an indication that it is 
 owing to the constant effort to make the lower weight con- 
 form to the monetary units of the various periods at which the 
 Commentaries were written that the confusion has in great 
 part arisen. We find the Farman = 3 dirha/ms of 4 mads, to 
 3 coins of 5 annas, and to 3-^ coins. Dr West, calculating the 
 amia on the basis of the old rupee of Guzarat (Pt. III., p. 180), 
 makes the coin of Col. IV. = 50 grains Troy, the old rupee being 
 less than its present weight (180 grains). The Farman in this 
 case is 150 grains. The 3 dirhams of 4 mads each probably 
 
THE VALUE OP A COW. 151 
 
 are the same in amount. So too are the three coins and a half 
 of Col. IV. In which case each coin must weigh 43 grains 
 (150 -T- 3J = 42^), that is the regular weight of the dirhains 
 struck by the Arab conquerors of Persia. Comparing Cols. iii. 
 and IV., we shall find the Agerept worth respectively 53 dirhams 
 and 16 stirs, the Avoirist set at 73 dirhams and 25 stirs. We 
 find then a very close approximation in comparative values. 
 The same proportion for all practical purposes exists between 
 the coin of 5 annas (50 grains) and the coin of 43 grains, as 
 between the 53 dirhams, and 16 stirs and 73 dirhams and 25 
 stirs. But it is evident that in Col. III. the coin of 5 annas is 
 a thing quite distinct from the dirhams mentioned in the same 
 table, or else why is there a difference in nomenclature ? The 
 dirham is probably the usual dirham of 43 — 40 grains. But 
 as we find 53 of these dirhams = 16 stirs of Col. iv. accordingly 
 the stir of Col. IV. = 132 grains Troy, which is plainly the 
 Babylonian shekel, and 73 dirhams = 25 stirs. This gives an 
 average for the stir of 126 grains Troy, which again points 
 directly to the light shekel of 130 grains Troy, or in other 
 words to the weight of the Daric. Another piece of evidence 
 in the same direction is the fact that the Sassanide kings 
 struck their silver coins on the so-called Attic standard, which 
 of course was identical with that in use from the earliest times 
 in Asia, as the standard of the Daric. The founder of the 
 Sassanide Dynasty, Ardeshir, struck his first gold coins on this 
 standard (staters of 135-0), whilst all the silver coins of this 
 dynasty are half-staters (65 grains) of the same standard. The 
 statement in Col. I. that each stir has four dirhams probably 
 refers to a later period, when 4 dirhams of the ordinary Mu- 
 hammedan standard (43 grains Troy) were equivalent to a 
 rupee (180 — 170 grains). 
 
 If it should be objected that the istir of the Avesta is the 
 old Persic silver standard of 172 grains, my reply is that as it 
 is evident from what we have seen above that in this weight 
 system there were siody staters in the mina, this must be the 
 weight, not the silver coin, as there were only fifty staters in the 
 money mina. 
 
 The ox of the Zend-Avesta according to tradition is there- 
 
152 THE GOLD UNIT EVERYWHERE 
 
 fore rated at 12 stirs or staters of 130 grains of silver each. 
 From the time of Alexander right down to the third century 
 after Christ it is probable that all through the Eastern Mediter- 
 ranean and Asia Minor gold was to silver as 12 : 1. If this 
 were so, the ox, of the Avesta was worth 130 grs. of gold, that is 
 the weight of a Daric, and of the Homeric ox-unit. 
 
 Such then are the approximate results that we have been 
 able to obtain regarding the value in gold of an ox in various 
 parts of the ancient world. Of course I do not pretend that 
 they have the same force as if they represented the value of the 
 ox everywhere in one particular epoch, or as if we had found the 
 ox directly equated to gold in every case. But on the other hand 
 the persistency of prices in semi-civilized countries is a fact well 
 known: for example, prices have changed but very slightly in 
 India' during a long course of years, for although the silver 
 rupee has sunk to about two-thirds of its nominal value in 
 exchanges for gold, it purchases as much as ever in India. 
 It is likely therefore that the conventional value of the ox 
 would have remained unchanged for a long period of time, 
 and the fact that our approximate values taken from various 
 countries and from various centuries so closely coincide is a 
 strong indication that such was the case. 
 
 Savages are still more conservative in their ideas of the 
 relative value of certain articles ; and when once a standard 
 price has been fixed for certain commodities, it is almost im- 
 possible to get them to change. 
 
 Thus I am told by Mr W. H. Caldwell that, when he gave 
 half-a-crown to a Queensland black for the first specimen of a 
 certain kind of animal brought into camp, henceforth he had to 
 pay the same amount for every specimen, even when they came 
 in considerable numbers. So with the early men of Asia and 
 Europe who first possessed cattle, and later on gold. Once a 
 certain amount of gold was taken as the recognized value of a 
 cow of certain age, the idea would become strongly rooted that 
 so much gold was the proper equivalent of a cow. And it 
 would only be in the lapse of centuries and with the develop- 
 
 1 Report of the Royal Commission appointed to enquire into the recent changes 
 in the relative values of the precious metals. 1st Report, p. 60 (1866). 
 
THE VALUE OF A COW. 153 
 
 ment of cities and general commerce that the price of cattle 
 would begin to fluctuate. 
 
 But even when such variation in price arose, it made no 
 difference as regards the weight standard. The unit had 
 already long been fixed and it remained unaltered, just as the 
 beaver skin of account still means only two shillings, although a 
 real beaver skin is now worth many times that amount. 
 
 Another reason why the price of cattle would remain 
 stationary would be that in early times as all the cows were 
 kept under more or less similar conditions of food, and there 
 was no attempt at the development of superior breeds, there 
 would be little difference in the value of animals of the same 
 age. 
 
 The connection between the cow and the gold unit is 
 rendered all the more probable not merely by the fact so often 
 noticed that the words for money in different languages originally 
 meant cattle, but by the remarkable fact that the earliest known 
 weights are in the form of cattle. The relation between weight 
 and money must always be close, but it comes still more 
 prominently into view, when as yet there is no coinage, but 
 gold and silver pass by weight alone. If then the value of 
 a cow formed the first gold unit, we can at once understand 
 why the first weights took the form of oxen and sheep. 
 
 It was not for mere artistic reasons, for whilst such animal 
 weights appear on Egyptian paintings, the numerous known 
 Egyptian weights are of a very conventional form, as we shall 
 find below. Doubtless the horns and ears made a cow's head 
 exceedingly ill-suited for a weight, and in course of time utility 
 prevailed over the traditional idea that the weight unit ought 
 to take the shape of the animal, whose value in gold it was 
 meant to represent. 
 
 The following table sums up briefly the results of this 
 chapter: 
 
 Homeric ox-unit = 130 — 135 grains of gold. 
 
 Roman ox (5th cent. B.C.) = 135 „ „ 
 
 Sicilian (5th cent. B.C.) = 135 „ „ 
 
 Ancient German =120 „ „ 
 
154 THE GOLD UNIT EVERYWHERE THE VALUE OF A COW. 
 
 Ancient Gaulish =120 grains of gold. 
 
 Phoenician? (4th cent. B.C.) =135 „ „ 
 
 Egyptian (1500 B.C.?) = 140 grains of silver = 140 grains 
 
 of gold(?). 
 Hebrew =130 grains of gold. 
 
 Zend-Avesta =130 „ „ 
 
 Burgundian =140 „ „ 
 
 Alamannic =120 „ „ 
 
 Scandinavian'(8thcent.A.D.)= 128 „ „ 
 
 As has been remarked before, I do not include the values 
 of the ox or cow in the ancient Laws of Wales or Ireland, since 
 from the insular position of Britain and Ireland the principle 
 that we must have unbroken touch between the various peoples 
 in order to have a constant unit does not apply. There could 
 be no free flow of trade in cattle between Britain and the 
 continent until the development -of steam navigation. 
 
 It is worth noting that the value of a buffalo at the present 
 day among the Bahnars of Annam is almost the same as that 
 of the ancient ox. The buffalo is reckoned at 280 hoes''', that 
 is 28 francs = £1. 2s. 4>d. Taking gold at the rate of twopence 
 per grain, the value of the buffalo in gold is 134 grs. Troy. 
 
 ' This is almost exactly the weight of the ortug, into 3 of which the ora 
 (ounce) of 410 grs. was divided. The ortiig of gold being 136'7 grs., and the 
 value of a cow being 128 grs. of gold, it is hard not to believe that there was a 
 connection between them. (See App. C. ) 
 
 2 See above, p. 24. 
 
CHAPTER VII. 
 The Weight Systems of China and Further Asia. 
 
 Subieotos Orientis orae 
 Seras et ludos. 
 
 HoR. Carm. i. 12. 56. 
 
 We have now found that within the area where our 
 weight standards arose the ox was universally diffused, and 
 regarded as the chief and most general form of property and 
 medium of exchange; that over the same area gold was found to 
 be more or less equally distributed in antiquity ; that the 
 metallic unit is found in all cases adapted to the chief unit of 
 barter, whether that be ox or reindeer, beaver skin, or squirrel, 
 as soon as peoples have learned the use of metal ; and finally 
 that over our special area from the Atlantic to Central Asia the 
 cow at various times and places retained a value which fluctu- 
 ated only from 120 to 140 grains of gold. When therefore 
 we recall the fact, also pointed out above, that the gold unit 
 employed from Gaul to Central Asia was one that only fluctu- 
 ated from 120 to 140 grains, and when we recollect further that 
 this unit in the ancient Greek Epic is called not a talent but an 
 ox, when prices, and not merely the actual ingots of gold are 
 mentioned, the conclusion follows that not merely in Greece but 
 in all the other countries the gold unit represented originally 
 simply the conventional value of the cow as the immemorial 
 unit of barter. 
 
 Next follows an important question, How was the primitive 
 weight standard fixed? In other words, how did mankind 
 arrive at the general opinion that a weight of gold of about 
 
156 THE WEIGHT SYSTEMS OF CHINA AND FURTHER ASIA. 
 
 130 English grains was the equivalent to the conventional 
 value of the animal ? 
 
 If we could but discover a region in which the weight 
 and monetary systems still in use are essentially indepen- 
 dent of our Graeco-Asiatic standards, and where it could be 
 proved that the monetary system is an independent native 
 development, and where this development is of such recent date 
 that the record has been preserved in a written document, not 
 merely reaching us in the dim form of a tradition, blurred and 
 broken in the long and misty space of years that lie between 
 us and those who first shaped our system, we would undoubtedly 
 discern more clearly the stages of its evolution. 
 
 The Chinese empire with the neighbouring peoples who 
 have participated in its civilization afford us just the case which 
 we desire. It will be seen from what follows that not merely 
 the monetary system of China, but her weight system is of an 
 origin almost wholly unaffected by Western influences. 
 
 We saw above that the earliest form of money in Greece 
 took the form of spits or small rods of copper, no doubt of a 
 specified size ; we found in Annam that iron hoes, in mediaeval 
 India iron formed into large-sized needles, in modern times 
 in Central Africa pieces of iron of given dimensions, bars of iron 
 among the Hottentots and among the peoples of the West 
 Coast of AMca, brass rods of fixed length in the region of the 
 Congo, and pieces of a precious wood likewise of fixed dimensions, 
 have served or do still serve as media of exchange, and as 
 units by which the values of other commodities are mea- 
 sured. In all these cases mere tneasure not weight, is the 
 method of appraisement. As the archaic Greek "spit" or obolus 
 of bronze eventually became a round bronze coin, familiar to us 
 as Charon's fee, and in still later times under the abbreviation 
 oh. as the accountant's symbol for a half-penny, as d. {denarius) 
 denotes the penny, so we shall find that the common Chinese 
 copper coins pierced with a square hole in the centre have 
 had an almost identical history. 
 
 At the time when the Chinese made their great invasion 
 into South-eastern Asia (214 B.C.) they still were employing a 
 bronze currency under the form of knives, which were 135 
 
THE WEIGHT SYSTEMS OF CHINA AND FURTHER ASIA. 157 
 
 millimetres (5| in.) in length, bearing on the blade the 
 character minh, and furnished with a ring at the end of the 
 handle for stringing them. Under the ninth dynasty (479 — 
 501 A.D.) they used knives of the same form and metal, but 
 
 Fio. 21. Chinese Knife Money 
 (showing the evolution of the modern Chinese coins). 
 
 180 millim. (7-^ in.) in length, furnished with a large ring 
 at the end of the handle and inscribed with the characters 
 Tsy KiLh-u Hoa. Next the form of the knife was modified, the 
 handle disappeared, and the ring was attached directly to the 
 blade, but now as weight was regarded of importance, its thick- 
 ness was increased to preserve the full amount of metal, and 
 the ring became a flat round plate pierced with a hole for 
 the string ^ Later on these knives became really a conven- 
 tional currency, and for convenience the blade was got rid of, 
 and all that was now left of the original knife was the ring in 
 the shape of a round plate pierced with a square hole. This is 
 a brief history of the sapec (more commonly known to us as 
 cash) the only native coin of China, and which is found every- 
 where from Malaysia to Japan ^ 
 
 ' J. Silvestre, "Notes pour servir k la recherche et au olassement des mon- 
 naies et des m^dailles de Annam et de la Cochin-Chine Franijaise." Excursions 
 et Reconnaissances, No. 15 (1883), p. 395. 
 
 2 H. C. Millies, RechercTies sur les monnales des Indigenes de I'Archipel 
 Indien et de lapSninsule Malaie (La Haye, 1871). 
 
158 THE WEIGHT SYSTEMS OF CHINA AND FURTHER ASIA. 
 
 Except where foreign coins such as American silver dollars 
 are employed, all payments in silver and gold are made by 
 weight, the only money being the copper cash. The Chinese 
 metric system, like our own, is based on natural seeds or grains 
 of plants. Thus ten of a kind of seed called /ew (the Candarin) 
 probably placed sideways make 1 ts'un (the Chinese inch'), just 
 as our forefathers based the English inch on 3 barleycorns 
 placed lengthwise. So with their monetary system, 
 
 10 li^ (copper cash) = 1 fin {Candarin) of silver. 
 
 10 /em = 1 chi'en (mace). 
 
 10 chi'en = 1 Hung (or tael or Chinese ounce). 
 
 This linng or, as it is more commonly called, tael is the 
 maximum monetary weight. Hence we hear always of pay- 
 ments in silver as being 1000 or 2000 ounces and so on, but 
 never in the higher commercial units of the catty or pound, and 
 pical or hundredweight, to which we shall come immediately. 
 But though the Chinese never employed any coinage of gold or 
 silver, beyond all doubt they have possessed and employed both 
 metals for almost an incalculable time in the form of ingots of 
 rectangular shape, and of very accurately fixed dimensions. The 
 maximum unit employed in commercial relations between 
 China, Cochin-China, Annam and Cambodia is the weW or bar. 
 It is of course among her less advanced neighbours that we can 
 best see how the system developed and worked. For whilst 
 China herself now reckons exclusively by the tael or ounce, 
 Annam and Cambodia still employ ingots of fixed weights 
 and dimensions as metal units almost to the present time. 
 Thus when Msg. Taberdier in 1838 published his account of 
 the money of Annam, they had no coins except the ordinary 
 cash or sapec with a square hole in its centre, and which is 
 there made of zinc and called dcmg'', they had no coinage in the 
 proper sense of the terra. However they eniployed ingots of 
 gold and silver of a parallelopiped shape. Five sizes of ingots 
 were employed for both gold and silver alike. 
 
 ' Sir Thomas Wade's Colloquial Chinese Course, i. p. 213 (2nd ed.). 
 2 J. Silveatre, Op. cit. p. 308 aeqq. 
 
the weight systems of china and further asia. 159 
 
 Gold. 
 
 1. Nin-Vang, loaf of gold = 10 lu'ong or taels'(o\nices). 
 
 2. Thoi-Vang or Nua Nen-Vang = 5 lu'ong. 
 
 3. Lu'ong-Vang, nail of gold =1 lu'ong (S9-05 grammes). 
 
 4. Niia- Vang, half nail of gold =^ lu'ong. 
 
 5. The quarter lu'ong =\tael (9'762 gram.). 
 
 Silver. 
 
 1. N^n-bac, loaf of silver =10 lu'ong or taels. 
 
 2. Nua N4n-hac, half loaf of silver = 5 lu'ong. 
 
 3. Lu'ong or Dinh-hac, nail of silver = 1 tael. 
 
 4. Half Lu'ong, half nail = ^ tael. 
 
 5. Quarter Lu'ong = J tael (9'762 gram.). 
 
 The lowest unit then was the quarter nail of 152| grains 
 troy, whilst the largest was the nen of 6500 grains. These 
 ingots did not circulate freely but were generally kept in 
 wealthy families as reserve treasure. 
 
 In very similar manner in Greece and Italy gold and silver, 
 fashioned into talents and bars or wedges, were employed side 
 by side with the bronze oboli or spits which served as the 
 ordinary currency of every-day life. 
 
 We have now seen that the highest unit employed for silver 
 and gold is the Nen or bar of ten taels or ounces. Before going 
 further it will be convenient to describe briefly what we may 
 term the Chinese system of avoirdupois weight. Then we shall 
 give the system borrowed from the Chinese and used in Cam- 
 bodia and Coehin-China. 
 
 Chinese. 
 
 10 fSn = 1 ch'en' (mace). 
 10 ch'en^ = 1 Hang, tael or ounce. 
 
 16 tael = 1 chin, commonly known as catty, = 1^ lbs. English. 
 100 catties = 1 tan or shih*, commonly known to us as the 
 
 picul (= 133J lbs. English). 
 
160 THE WEIGHT SYSTEMS OF CHINA AND FURTHER ASIA. 
 
 Cambodia. Money system. 
 
 60 cash or sapecs of zinc = 1 tien. 
 
 10 tie7i = 1 string. 
 
 10 strings = 1 weW or bar of silver (90 francs). 
 
 The n^n is an ingot of silver of parallelepiped form, which 
 is invariably worth 100 strings of zinc cash'. This weVi is 
 subdivided for money of account as follows : 
 
 1 nen (375 grammes) = 10 denh. 
 1 denh =10 chi. 
 
 1 chi =10 htm. 
 
 1 hun =10 li. 
 
 They employ a coin of silver called a prac-bat or preasat, 
 worth 4 strings or ^ n£n'. 
 
 The Mexican piastre, which circulates also, is worth on the 
 average about 6 strings of cash. 
 
 1 gold ingot = 16 n^ns of silver. 
 
 The half ingot of gold is also used = 8 ingots of silver. 
 
 The unit of commercial or avoirdupois weight is the catty 
 (called by the Cambodians the neal) or pound. 
 
 Iw^aZ (catty) (600 grammes) = 16 tomlongs or taeZs (ounces). 
 1 tomlong (37 '5 grammes) = 10 chi (of 3"75 grammes). 
 1 chi =10 hun. 
 
 The preceding weights are plainly borrowed from the 
 Chinese, whilst the following are regarded as native in origin. 
 
 1 pey = 0"292 grammes. 
 4 pey = 1 fuong (1'174 grammes). 
 2fuong — 1 slong (2'344 grammes). 
 4 slong = 1 bat (9'375 grammes). 
 4< bat =1 tomlong (37'5 grammes). 
 
 For heavy merchandise they employ the hap or picul. 
 
 There are three varieties of picul : (1) that of the weight of 
 40 strings of cash (= 100 catties), (2) that of 42 strings, (3) 
 that of 45 strings. 
 
 1 .J. Moura, Le Royaume du Cambodge, i. p. 323 (Paris, 1883). 
 
 2 This coin bears on one side the sacred bird Hangsa, on the other a picture 
 of an ancient palace of the kings. 
 
THE WEIGHT SYSTEMS OF CHINA AND FURTHER ASIA. 161 
 
 It will be noticed that the first- mentioned is simply the 
 standard of the Chinese picul of 133^ lbs. English, whilst the 
 others are native. 
 
 In Annam we found that the ingots of gold and silver, 
 consisting of ten luongs or nails, were called were. The 
 luong was equal in weight to the Chinese Hung, and Cam- 
 bodian tomlong, and was also called diiih (dinh-bac, nail of 
 silver), thus being identical with the ten denh into which the 
 Cambodian n^n or bar is divided. 
 
 In Laos^ we again find the Chinese picul as the highest 
 weight unit. It is divided into 100 catties (here called Chang) 
 of 600 grammes each (l^-lb. Eng.). 
 
 1 picul = 100 catties. 
 
 1 catty (chang) = 10 damling (60 grammes). 
 1 damling = 4 bat (15 grammes). 
 
 1 bat = 4 chi (3'75 grammes). 
 
 1 chi =10 hum. 
 
 All these or their equivalents are used as money of account. 
 " If there is but little coin in Laos," says M. Aymonier, " there 
 are monies of account in abundance.'' In the south-west of the 
 country, Bassak and Attopoeu, Cambodian currency is employed, 
 and they count by the nSn or bar of silver. 
 
 1 jieVi =10 denhs (money of account). 
 1 denh = 10 strings of cash. 
 
 The string is also money of account and is worth the same 
 as the string of Annam, which is equal to the sling or Siamese 
 franc (which is worth 75 or 80 centimes). The n^n is also 
 divided into 100 chi, and as there are 100 strings in the meW, 
 the string of cash is equivalent to a chi of silver (3'75 gram.). 
 The Siamese coins known also to Cambodia were the weight 
 and money units of the ancient Cambodians, who probably 
 weighed their precious metals. In Laos all of them except 
 the tical are only monies of account. The tical or bat which 
 under the ancient round form^ was called clom in Cambodia is 
 
 ' E. Aymonier, Notes sur le Laos. Saigon, 1885. 
 
 2 For an account of the various kinds of Siamese coins of the bullet shape 
 of. Msg. Pallegoix, Description du royaume Thai ou Siam, i. 256 (Paris, 1854). 
 
 R. 11 
 
162 THE WEIGHT SYSTEMS OF CHINA AND FURTHER ASIA. 
 
 actually struck as a small piastre in Cambodia and Siam in 
 imitation of European money. This tical is worth 4 Siamese 
 slings, but the only monetary division of it known in Laos is 
 the local lot or small ingot of copper. 
 
 4 copper lots = 1 silver tical (=4 sling = 3 francs). 
 
 4 tical = 1 damling. 
 
 ^0 damling = 1 catty (chang). 
 
 50 catties = 1 picul. 
 
 The chang or catty of silver is a double one, hence 50 
 catties of silver are equal to 100 catties of ordinary commercial 
 weight. 
 
 The catty of silver thus weighs 1200 grammes instead of 
 600 grammes. 
 
 They likewise use the moeun of silver =10 Ghangs = ^ picid, 
 but more generally the moeun is used as a measure of capacity 
 which contains 20 catties of shelled rice, but as a measure of 
 capacity it varies and is sometimes equal to 20 catties, some- 
 times to 25 catties of rice. That it really is a measure of 
 capacity incorporated at a later date into the weight system 
 like our own bushels, barrels and quarters, is made probable 
 by the fact that in the provinces of Tonle, Eopon, and Melou 
 Pr^y they employ a tramein or bag containing 10 Cambodian 
 catties, and in the province of Siphoum the moeun is some- 
 times the name given to a bag or pannier of a cubit in depth, 
 and a cubit in width at the mouth. It is usually called kanchoen 
 {pannier), and contains 25 catties of rice, and 36 kanchoen make 
 a cartload. 
 
 We learn from another part of Laos an interesting fact 
 which also throws some light on the development of the larger 
 weight units from measures of capacity. For since in some 
 parts of that country the cocoanut is used as the measure of 
 capacity, and as neal, the native Cambodian name for the catty, 
 means simply a cocoanut, it looks as though this was the real 
 origin of the catty universally employed over all Further Asia. 
 This likewise gives us the reason why the catty of silver is 
 twice the weight of a catty of rice. If a weight unit is derived 
 from a measure of capacity, according to the nature of the sub- 
 
THK WEIGHT SYSTEMS OF CHINA AND FURTHER ASIA. 163 
 
 stance or liquid with which the measure is filled, the weight 
 unit derived will be heavier or lighter, just as the Irish barrel 
 of wheat is 6 stones heavier than the barrel of oats. A cocoa- 
 nut, or bamboo-joint filled with silver will give a far heavier 
 weight unit than if it is weighed when filled with rice. 
 
 We have now had a survey of the monetary and weight 
 systems of China, Annam, Cambodia and Laos, and everywhere 
 found that the weVi or bar of 10 taels is the highest known 
 metallic unit, and that except in Laos the counting of money even 
 by the catty or pound is unknown, the Chinese themselves only 
 employing the tael as their highest monetary unit, the catty 
 being kept as in Annam and Cambodia itself for ordinary 
 goods. This is borne out by the practices in the weighing of 
 gold. In Attopoeu, the region where gold is. found, 8 chi (=2 
 ticals or bats = 4 slings = 30 grammes) are exchanged for a bar 
 of silver (= 100 chi =375 grammes). M. Aymonier thinks 
 that the gold bat, that is to say the weight in gold of a tical 
 (15 grammes, 234 grains Troy), must have been the unit for 
 weighing gold, as formerly it was necessary to give a gold bat 
 in order to marry a girl of the blood royal. This gets con- 
 siderable support from the fact that in Sieng-Khan the gold 
 bat has only the weight of a sling or chi (58^ grains Troy), that 
 is the quarter of a tical, and the weight of the tical or bat is 
 called a damling. In fact they hardly reckon gold in any other 
 way than by this small damling which is only the weight of 
 a tical (234 grains Troy). In reference to my argument 
 that as gold is the first of all things to be weighed, the 
 primitive weight unit is certain to be small, as no man has, as 
 a rule, any need to weigh his gold by the hundredweight or 
 large mercantile talent, this fact that the highest unit for 
 weighing gold in Attopoeu is so small, not even reaching the 
 weight of the Graeco-Phoenician heavy gold shekel or double 
 ox-unit of 260 grains, is of considerable importance. 
 
 This region supplies us with yet another point which can 
 help to clear up the history of early metallic currency. The 
 iron ingots which come from the Cambodian provinces of Kom- 
 pong Soai form a special kind of money. These ingots are not 
 weighed, but they have the length of the space between the 
 
 11—2 
 
164 THE WEIGHT SYSTEMS OF CHINA AND FURTHER ASIA. 
 
 base of the thumb and the tip of the forefinger, they are in 
 breadth two fingers, and one finger in thickness in the middle, 
 thinning off to either end. Three of these ingots =1 chi=l 
 sling =1 string of cash; thus 12 ingots = 1 tical of silver. 
 These ingots are also counted by bags of 20 ; thus 1 nen or 
 bar of silver = 15 bags = 300 ingots of iron. 
 
 At Bassak the iron ingot is replaced by the lat, the copper 
 ingot of Laos, which varies in value in the different moeungs 
 (provinces) according to its size. Here is a remarkable con- 
 firmation of my contention that it was only at a period con- 
 siderably later than the weighing of gold that the scales were 
 employed for copper and iron, the catty being kept as in 
 Annam and Cambodia for ordinary goods. 
 
 We can now. make a further advance in our quest of the 
 first beginnings of money and weights in this interesting region. 
 There are many wild tribes in Annam and Laos, who still 
 employ no method save that of barter, when dealing one with 
 another, although when they touch on the more civilized 
 regions they have to conform their native systems in some 
 degree to the more developed currency of their neighbours, 
 from whom they have to procure the few luxuries of their 
 simple life. We saw above that among the wild tribesmen 
 all articles have a well-defined relationship to each other, 
 some particular article being usually taken as the common 
 measure of all the rest, or rather two or three so that they 
 may have units for estimating their more common as well as 
 their more valuable possessions. So in Annam the buffalo 
 often serves as the general unit of value for the more valu- 
 able articles. Thus a large chaldron is worth three buffalos, 
 a handsome gong two buffalos, a small gong one buffalo, six 
 copper dishes one buffalo, two lances one buffalo, a rhinoceros 
 horn eight buffalos, a large pair of elephant's tusks six buffalos, 
 a small pair three buffalos'. Thus the buffalo which takes the 
 place of the ox in China and South-Eastern Asia, is used as the 
 commercial unit in like fashion as we found the ox employed 
 among the Homeric Greeks, the ancient Italians, the ancient 
 
 ' E. Aymonier, GocMn-Ghi'iie Frangaise. Excursiotis et Hecomiaissances 
 Vol. X. No. 24 (1885), p. 31?, 
 
THE WEIGHT SYSTEMS OF CHINA AND FUETHEK ASIA. 165 
 
 Irish, and the modern Ossetes. But the Annamites themselves 
 employ as currency the silver bar and string of cash as we 
 saw above : accordingly when the hill tribes have dealings with 
 the people of the plain the full grown buffalo is reckoned at a 
 bar of silver, or, its equivalent, 100 strings of cash', while the 
 small buffalo is set at fifty strings. 
 
 Thus the Orang Glai have often to buy a pair of elephant's 
 tusks at the cost of eight buffalos or eight bars of silver. 
 Taxes are paid in buffalos ; thus the Tjrons of Karang pay a 
 buffalo for each house, or compound for the whole village by a 
 payment of ten buffalos whose horns are at least as long as 
 their ears'". Here then we find that exactly as the ancient 
 Irish when they borrowed the Roman system of unciae and 
 scripula (unga and screapall) equated the ounce of silver to 
 their own unit, the cow, so we find these wild tribes of An- 
 nam forced to adapt their primitive unit to the metallic unit 
 of their more cultured neighbours. Again, the Bahnars of 
 Annam, who dwell on the borders of Laos, have much the 
 same system. With them the highest unit is the head, i.e. 
 a male slave, who is estimated, according to his strength, age 
 and skill, at 5, 6, or 7 buffalos, or the same number of kettles, 
 as the buffalo and the kettle have the same value, which 
 naturally varies with the size and age of the animal and 
 the quality of the kettle. A full grown buffalo, or a large 
 kettle, is worth seven glazed jars of Chinese shape with a 
 capacity of 10 to 15 litres each. One jar is worth 4 muks. 
 The mule was originally the name of some special article, but 
 now is simply used as a unit of account. Each muk is worth 
 10 mats, or iron hoes, which are manufactured by the C^dans, 
 and which form the sole agricultural implement of the wild 
 tribes of all these regions. This hoe is the smallest monetary 
 unit used by the Bahnars, and is worth about one penny in 
 European goods. This mat or hoe serves them as small cur- 
 rency and all petty transactions are carried on by it. Thus a 
 
 ' Aymonier, ibid. 
 
 2 This mode of estimating the age of the buffalo by the length of its horns 
 may throw some light on the young ox suis cornibus instructus of the Marseilles 
 inscription (p. 143). 
 
166 THE WEIGHT SYSTEMS OP CHINA AND FURTHER ASIA. 
 
 large bamboo hat costs 2 hoes, a Bahnar knife 2 hoes, ordinary 
 arrows are sold at 30 for 1 hoe and so on. A large elephant is 
 worth from 10 to 1.5 "heads" or slaves, whilst a horse costs 
 3 or 4 kettles or buffalos. When we read of such a state 
 of human society we seem to be transported back into that 
 far away Homeric time, and as we hear of slaves, and kine, 
 chaldrons and kettles we think of the old Epics with their tale 
 of slaves valued in beeves, and " crumple-horned shambling 
 kine, and tripods " and " shining chaldrons." In the light of 
 such analogies we at last can understand the significance of 
 the 10 axes and 10 ' half-axes" which formed the first and 
 second prizes in the Iliad^ when Achilles "set out for the 
 archers the dark-hued iron, and put down 10 axes and 10 half- 
 axes." Who can doubt that these axes and half-axes played 
 much the same part in the Homeric system of currency as the 
 hoes do at this present moment in that of the Bahnars of 
 Annam? Probably such too were the 12 axes which Penelope* 
 brought out from the treasure chamber to serve as a target 
 for the suitors in their contests with the bow of Ulysses. The 
 hoe is thus the lowest unit of currency among the Bahnars. 
 From the known interrelations of all the articles of daily life it 
 is easy to estimate how many hoes any even of their more costly 
 possessions is worth. Thus the full-grown buffalo = 7 jars = 28 
 muks = 280 hoes, or about £1. 3s. 4cZ. of our money. All these 
 transactions require no use of weights, being reckoned by bulk 
 or tale. But now comes the most interesting feature for us, a 
 people in the complete stage of barter, but who actually possess, 
 work and traffic in gold. 
 
 In all the streams on the side next Laos the wild people 
 wash gold, men, women and children all alike joining in this 
 laborious industry, and employ as 'cradles' little baskets made of 
 bamboo. The gold is sold in dust at the rate of the weight in 
 gold of one grain of maize for one hoe. Here then we have 
 finally run to ground one of the principal objects of our quest. 
 We have a primitive people, who carry on all their trade by 
 means of barter, who have no currency in the precious metals, 
 but who employ as their most general unit of small value the 
 
 1 XXIII. 850 sq. 2 Od. XXI. 76. 
 
THE WEIGHT SYSTEMS OF CHINA AND FUKTHER ASIA. 167 
 
 iron hoe. They are found to weigh one thing and one only, 
 namely gold, and for that purpose they do not employ any 
 weight standard borrowed from China or Annam, but equate a 
 certain amount of gold to the unit of barter, and then fix as a 
 constant that amount of gold by balancing it against a grain of 
 the corn that forms one of the chief staples of their subsistence. 
 Nature herself has supplied man with weights of admirable 
 exactitude ready to his hand in the natural seeds of plants, and 
 as soon as he finds out the need of determining with great 
 care the precious substance which he has to win with toil and 
 hardship from the stream, he takes the proffered means and 
 fashions for himself a balance and weights. 
 
 We saw that a buffalo was worth 280 hoes ; it is therefore 
 an easy task for a Bahnar to tell its worth in gold. It was 
 equally simple for the first Aryan or Semite who framed the 
 gold shekel standard to compute the exact amount of gold 
 which would represent the value of an ox. But perhaps we 
 have not reached the earliest stage of all in the development of 
 a standard for the .sale of gold. I ventured to put forward in 
 1887 the suggestion that the way in which the amount of gold 
 which represented the value of a cow was first fixed approxi- 
 mately was by measuring it in some way, as for instance by taking 
 the amount which would fit in the palm of the hand, somewhat 
 in the fashion that rustics measure gunpowder or shot for a 
 gun. What was then but a mere guess may be now regarded 
 as fairly certain. That excellent observer, M. Aymonier, notes 
 that the Tapak tribe, who live at a distance of six days' journey 
 from Attopoeu, wash gold. The women wade into the streams 
 (after having first carefully placed five flowers or five leaves at 
 the foot of a tree close by the stream to ensure good luck). 
 Each dips a water-tight bag into the sand at the bottom of the 
 stream, and after a long series of rewashings and cleansings at 
 last gets the gold dust in a state of purity'. The savages carry 
 it to Attopoeu, and sell it at the rate of 9 chi of gold for a nin 
 or bar of silver (= 100 chi). The relative value in Attopoeu is 
 8 chi or two hats of gold to one bar (= 100 chi) of silver, or as 
 they express it one tical of gold is changed for 12 ticals of silver. 
 1 E. Aymonier, Notes sur le Laos, p. 33. 
 
168 THE WEIGHT SYSTEMS OP CHINA AND FURTHER ASIA. 
 
 "The tical of gold is," it is said, "equivalent to the weight of 32 
 grains of a peculiar kind of rice of the country, with large grains 
 and of a red colour, which is called ivory rice." Here we have 
 the weighing by natural grains as before, but Aymonier adds 
 (p. 35) that "the natives relate that gold was formerly so 
 abundant that without weighing it people were content to 
 measure it. A little stick of gold an inch broad and a span 
 long was exchanged against a buffalo." 
 
 We found the Bahnars equating a small quantity of gold to 
 their smallest unit of barter, the hoe; now we find that in the 
 wild parts of Laos the unit of gold, before weights of natural 
 grains were employed, was based by measurement upon the 
 buffalo, the chief unit of barter. Thus we have found among 
 the remote peoples of Further Asia the very method of fixing 
 a metallic unit, which I have endeavoured to prove was that 
 followed by the Aryan and Semitic races in arriving at that 
 shekel of gold, which was the common standard of all the 
 civilized peoples of the ancient world, and which was the parent 
 of all our mediaeval and modern systems. 
 
CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 How WERE Primitive Weight Units fixed ? 
 
 Ordiar ex minimis. 
 
 Carm, de pojideribus. 
 
 We have seen that the Chinese system of weights is based 
 upon natural seeds of plants, and we have actually found the 
 wild hillsmen of Annam and Laos weighing their gold dust by 
 grains of maize and rice. But it may be urged by the advo- 
 cates of a Babylonian scientific origin based on the one-fifth of 
 the cube of the royal ell, which in turn is based upon the sun's 
 apparent diameter, that the Chinese names of weights are merely 
 conventional terms taken from the name of certain seeds, and 
 on the other hand that the mere fact that a very barbarous 
 people like the Bahnars of Annam weigh their gold dust by 
 grains of rice is no evidence that people in a higher stage of 
 culture were content with such rude metric standards. I 
 propose to show in this chapter that it has been the actual 
 practice of peoples as far advanced in civilization as the ancient 
 Greeks or Italians, to employ seeds as weights down to the pre- 
 sent day in Asia, that it was the general practice in the middle 
 ages, that it was likewise the practice of the Romans of the 
 empire, of the Greeks, and finally that such too was the prac- 
 tice of the Assyrians themselves at a period long before the 
 bronze Lion weights were ever cast, or the stone Duck weights 
 were carved. If I succeed in proving this proposition, the doc- 
 trine that the art of weighing was scientific must give place to 
 the contention that it was purely empirical. 
 
170 HOW WERE PRIMITIVE WEIGHT UNITS FIXED ? 
 
 As we have found among the barbarians of Asia the first 
 beginnings of the art of weighing by the employment of grains 
 of rice and maize, it is best for us to take first in order some 
 other Asiatic countries lying towards the same region. 
 
 The great islands of the Indian Archipelago, singularly rich 
 in all endowments of nature, have for ages enjoyed a high 
 degree of culture. Conveniently placed, they have received 
 all the advantages of contact with the civilization of China, 
 India, and even that of the Arabs from the distant west of Asia. 
 Never were people more favourably situated for obtaining 
 foreign systems of weights and measures, if they felt so disposed, 
 than the Malays of Java and Sumatra and the other islands of 
 the Indian Archipelago. That admirable observer, John Craw- 
 furd, writing in 1820 says': "In the native measures everything 
 is estimated by bulk and not by weight. Among a rude 
 people corn would necessarily be the first commodity that 
 would render it a matter of necessity and convenience to fix 
 some means for its exchange or barter. The manner in which 
 this is effected among the Javanese will point out the imper- 
 fection of their methods. Rice, the principal grain, is in 
 reaping nipped off the stalk with a few inches of the straw, 
 tied up in sheaves or parcels and then housed or sold, or other- 
 wise disposed of The quantity of rice in the straw which can 
 be clenched between the thumb and the middle finger is called 
 a gagam or handful, and forms the lowest denomination. Three 
 gagams or handfuls make one pochong, the quantity which 
 can be clenched between both hands joined. This is properly 
 a sheaf Two sheaves or pochongs joined together, as is always 
 the case, for the convenience of being thrown across a stick 
 for transportation, make a double sheaf or gedeng. Five 
 gedengs make a songga, the highest measure in some provinces, 
 or twenty-four make an hainat, the more general measure. 
 From their very nature these measures are indefinite and 
 hardly amount to more accuracy than we employ ourselves 
 when we speak of sheaves of corn. In the same district they 
 are tolerably regular in the quantity of grain or straw they 
 
 1 History of the Indian Archipelago by John Crawfard, F.R.S. Vol. i., 
 p. 271. 
 
HOW WERE PHIMITIVE WEIGHT UNITS FIXED ? 171 
 
 contain, but such is the wide difference between different 
 districts or provinces, that the same nominal measures are 
 often twice, nay three times as large in one as in another. For 
 the hamat or larger measure perhaps about eight hundred pounds 
 avoirdupois might be considered a fair average for the different 
 provinces of Java. This may convey some loose notion of the 
 quantities intended to be represented. For dry and liquid 
 measures they may naturally have recourse to the shell of the 
 cocoanut and the joint of the bamboo which are constantly at 
 hand. The first called by the Malays chupa is estimated to be 
 two and a half pounds avoirdupois. The second is called by 
 some tribes kulch and is equal to a gallon, but the most com- 
 mon bamboo measure is the gantung, which is twice this 
 amount. To those exact and business-like dealers, the Chinese, 
 and in a less degree to the Arabs and people of the east coast 
 of the Indian Peninsula, the Indian islanders are chiefly in- 
 debted for any precision we find in their weights. In all the 
 traffic carried on between the commercial tribes and foreigners, 
 the Chinese weights, though occasionally under native names, 
 are constantly referred to. The lowest of these, called some- 
 times by the native name of Bungkal, but more frequently by 
 the Chinese name of Tahil \tael\, varies from twenty-four penny- 
 weights nine grains to thirty pennyweights and twenty grains. 
 Ten of these make a kati [catty] or about twenty ounces avoir- 
 dupois; one hundred katis make a pikul or 133^ lbs. avoirdupois, 
 and thirty piculs make one koyan. Of these the kati and the 
 pikul, because they are constantly referred to in considerable 
 mercantile dealings, are the only well-defined weights. The 
 koyan by some is reckoned at twenty pikuls, hy others at 
 twenty-seven, twenty-eight and even at forty. The Dutch are 
 fond of equalizing it with their own standards and consider it 
 as equal to a last or two tons. 
 
 '■' The Bahara, an Arabic weight, is occasionally used in the 
 weighing of pepper, but its amount is very indefinite, for in 
 some of the countries of the Archipelago it amounts to 396 lbs., 
 and in others to 660 lbs." 
 
 Elsewhere he says', " The picid is strictly a Chinese weight 
 
 1 P. 275. 
 
172 HOW WERE PRIMITIVE WEIGHT UNITS FIXED ? 
 
 as its amount shews, though the term happens in this case to be 
 native. Its meaning in the vernacular languages is a natural 
 load or burthen, and when used in this primitive sense it, 
 without reference to the Chinese weight, is not found to 
 exceed eighty pounds avoirdupois." This is a fact of great 
 importance as we shall see when we come to the development 
 of the mina and talent of Graeco- Asiatic commerce. 
 
 Finally Crawfurd says, " The nice question of weighing gold, 
 the only native commodity which could not be estimated by 
 tale or bulk, has given rise to the use of weights among the 
 natives themselves. Grains of rice are still occasionally used 
 in the weighing of gold in the neighbourhood of the gold mines 
 in Sumatra " (p. 274). 
 
 I have quoted at full length these passages in order that 
 the reader may accept with fuller confidence statements so 
 instructive as regards the origin of weight, the first object 
 to be weighed, and the origin of the picvl, or as we may 
 call it the talent of Eastern Asia. Nine years before Craw- 
 furd wrote there had appeared William Marsden's admirable 
 History of Sumatra^. He gives us far fuller information on 
 the subject of gold than Crawfurd has done. Thus he writes: 
 " In those parts of the country where traffic in this article 
 (gold dust) is considerable, it is employed as currency instead 
 of coin ; every man carries small scales about him, and pur- 
 chases are made with it so low as to the weight of a grain 
 or two of padi. Various seeds are used as gold weights, but 
 more especially these two : the one called rakat or saga-tim- 
 hangan {Glycine abrus L or ahribs maculatus of the Batavian 
 trans.), being the well-known scarlet pea with a black spot, 
 twenty-four of which constitute a mas, and sixteen mas (mace) 
 a tail (tael) : the other called saga puku and kondori batang 
 {Aden anthera pavonia L), a scarlet or rather coral bean much 
 larger than the former, and without the black spot. It is the 
 candarin weight of the Chinese, of which one hundred make a 
 tail and equal, according to the tables published by Stevens, to 
 5 •7984- gr. Troy, but the average weight of those in my posses- 
 
 ' History of Sumatra by William Marsden, F.E.S. (Loudon, 1811), p. 171. 
 
HOW WERE PRIMITIVE WEIGHT UNITS FIXED? 173 
 
 sion is 10"50 Troy grains. The tail differs however in the 
 northern and southern parts of the island, being at Natal, 
 Padang, Bencoolen and elsewhere twenty-six pennyweights six 
 grains. At Achin the hangkal of thirty pennyweights twenty- 
 one grains is the standard. Spanish dollars are everywhere 
 current and accounts are kept in dollars, sukus (imaginary 
 quarter dollars) and kepping or copper cash, of which four 
 hundred go to the dollar. Besides these there are silver 
 fanams, single, double and treble (the latter, called tali), 
 coined at Madras, twenty-four /anams or eight talis being equal 
 to the Spanish dollar, which is always valued in the English 
 settlements at five shillings." 
 
 He adds that copper is sold by weight (jpicul), and that tin, 
 which was accidentally discovered in 1710 by the burning of a 
 house, is exported for the most part in small pieces or cakes 
 called tampangs, sometimes in slabs (p. 172), and furthermore 
 they purchase bar iron by measurement instead of by weight 
 (p. 176). 
 
 Several points of great importance are to be noticed in the 
 foregoing statements. Firstly, that whilst for foreign trade 
 with the Chinese they employ the Chinese weight, which we 
 know always by its Malay name of picul, a well-defined 
 weight standard of 133^ lbs. avoirdupois, they had evidently 
 a native unit of weight, their own picul, which simply means 
 and actually was as much as a man can carry on his back, 
 and which, as we saw, rarely exceeds 80 lbs. avoirdupois. 
 This seems to give us an insight into the manner in which the 
 most primitive highest weight unit is arrived at. A man's 
 load is one of those natural standards which will vary according 
 to race and climate, and the conditions under which the load 
 has to be borne. Thus, the average weight of the load borne 
 by a dock porter who has to endure the strain for only some 
 few yards, will of course be far higher than that carried by 
 the porters of travellers in Central Africa, where the load has 
 to be borne day after day on a march of several hundred, 
 or a thousand miles. Thus in the case of the Madis, a pure 
 negro tribe, the average load seems to be about 50 pounds, 
 which they can carry "20 miles a day for eight or ten con- 
 
174 HOW WERE PRIMITIVE WEIGHT UNITS FIXED? 
 
 secutive days without shewing any signs of distress ^" The 
 Chinese, the superiors in science of all Eastern Asia, have care- 
 fully adjusted this " load" and it makes, as we have seen above, 
 their highest weight unit. Its particular amount is probably 
 due to the fact that, having carefully fixed the weight of the 
 smaller units, the candarin, the mace, the liimg or tael, and 
 the catty, their pound, they simply took the hundredfold of the 
 chang or catty as the standard for their highest unit, and thus 
 that which at an earlier stage was just as vague and fluctuating 
 as the picul, or back-loads in use still among the less-advanced 
 peoples of the Indian Archipelago, became a fixed scientific unit. 
 Secondly, we must notice that the Malays have not followed 
 the Chinese in the subdivisions of the catty. For whilst in 
 China 16 taels or ounces go to the catty, the Malays follow 
 more strictly the decimal system, and make their catty simply 
 the tenfold of the tael or ounce. This same method of division 
 we found already in Annam, and not only in Annam but also in 
 Cambodia and Laos we found the silver nSn or bar, invariably 
 consisting of ten such parts, corresponding in weight to the 
 Chinese tael, sixteen of which go to the catty. 
 
 It would appear, then, that here we have a combination of 
 units of weight and units of capacity. The higher gold and 
 silver unit, the nen, is simply the tenfold of the lower unit, the 
 tael or ounce, while the catty, which is never employed in 
 China in estimating gold or silver, but is a genuine commercial 
 unit, was probably originally some natural unit of capacity. 
 We saw strong evidence of this in Cambodia, where the name 
 for this weight is neal or cocoanut, and we have just found 
 the cocoanut as the chief unit of dry measure amongst 
 the Malays of the Indian Seas. It was probably found that 
 16 times the tael or ounce came nearer to the weight of the 
 contents of a cocoanut or bamboo joint (whatever kind of 
 matter they may have weighed in it for this purpose, whether 
 rice, or water), than the original 10 ounces, which formed the 
 bar, the highest genuine weight unit. Sixteen was likewise a 
 convenient number, its factors being numerous, and it could be 
 
 1 E. W. Felkin, 'Notes on the Madi or Moon tribe of Central Africa.' Pro- 
 ceedings of Royal Society of ICdinlmrrih, Vol. xii. pp. 303, seqq. 
 
HOW WERE PRIMITIVE WEIGHT UNITS FIXED? 175 
 
 divided in four portions, each of which contained four other 
 units. It will presently be a question as to whether similar 
 influences have not produced our pound avoirdupois, with its 
 16 sub-multiples. 
 
 M. Moura found a difficulty regarding the Cambodian neal 
 or cocoanut catty ; because a neal of rice only weighs half the 
 weight, at which the neal is rated as a weight. But we saw 
 in Java that the chapa or cocoanut measure is estimated at 
 2^ pounds avoirdupois. It is then not improbable that some 
 liquid or substance far heavier than rice was used to fill the cocoa- 
 nut, when the value of its contents was being ascertained by 
 weighing so as to serve as a general unit. The same variation 
 in weight, owing to the different nature of its contents, has, as 
 mentioned before, given rise in Ireland to barrels of various 
 weights. Thus a barrel of wheat contains 20 stone avoirdu- 
 pois, a barrel of potatoes 24 stone, a barrel of barley 16 stone, 
 and a barrel of oats 14 stone. This diversity simply arose from 
 comparative lightness or heaviness of the different commodities 
 which were measured by one and the same unit of capacity : 
 the barrel itself, having been fixed by a process of measure- 
 ment, similar to that by which the milk-pan was regulated 
 among the Welsh, and the pannier among the natives of 
 Laos. The principle by which higher units of capacity or 
 weight are formed is likewise well illustrated by the instance 
 given above of the cartload of rice, which is simply regarded as 
 the multiple of the pannier or bag, which forms the smaller 
 unit for rice. The size of the cartload would be conditioned by 
 the size of the cart usually employed, which in turn would 
 depend on a variety of other things, such as the nature of the 
 country, or its roads, or the kind of animals employed for 
 draught. The vagueness in amount of the koyan or multiple 
 of the incul noticed by Crawfurd, may thus meet with a reason- 
 able explanation. 
 
 We may now return- to the mainland of Asia, where we 
 shall find in the weight system of the Hindus at least one 
 remarkable point of affinity with that of Sumatra. Marsden 
 has told us that the rakat or scarlet pea with a black spot is 
 one of the chief weights employed for gold in Sumatra. This 
 
176 HOW WERE PRIMITIVE WEIGHT UNITS FIXED? 
 
 rakat is none other than the ratti, which is usually taken as 
 the basis of the modern Hindu weight system. " This weight," 
 says that eminent scholar ColebrookeS " is the lowest denomi- 
 nation in general use, commonly known by the name ratti, the 
 same with rattika, which, as well as raktika, denotes the red 
 seed as krishnala indicates the black seed of the gunjd- 
 creeper." Mr Thomas has shown the true weight of the ratti 
 is 1"75 grains^. 
 
 Many different standards have been used in India for various 
 purposes, one for the weighing of gold, another for the weighing 
 of silver, another used by jewellers, and yet another by the 
 medical tribe, but all alike start from the ratti. 
 
 " The determination of the true weight of the ratti has done 
 much both to facilitate and give authority to the comparison of 
 the ultimately divergent standards of the ethnic kingdoms of 
 India. Having discovered the guiding unit, all other calcula- 
 tions become simple, and present singularly convincing results, 
 notwithstanding that the bases of all these estimates rest upon 
 so erratic a test as the growth of the seed of the ^tmja-creeper 
 {Abrius precatorius) under the varied influences of soil and 
 climate. Nevertheless the small compact grain, checked in 
 early times by other products of nature, is seen to have the 
 remarkable faculty of securing a uniform average through- 
 out the entire continent of India, which only came to be 
 disturbed when monarchs like Shir Sh^h and Akbar in 
 their vanity raised the weight of the coinage without any 
 reference to the numbers of rattis, inherited from Hindu 
 sources, and officially recognized in the old, but entirely dis- 
 regarded and left undefined in the reformed Muhammadan 
 mintages ^" We shall learn shortly that in its uniformity the 
 ratti does not differ from other seeds such as wheat and barley. 
 Probably, however, the fact that the £fM7i/a-creeper was found 
 everywhere in India gave it its position of a universal standard. 
 
 1 H. T. Colebrooke, On Indian Weights and Measures (Miscellaneous Essays 
 edited by Prof. E. B. Cowell, 1873), Vol. i. 528—543. 
 '^ Numismatic Chronicle, iv. 131 (n. b.). 
 3 Thomas, Initial Coinage of Bengal, ii. p. 6 (Rmjal Asiatic Journal, Vol. 
 
 VI.). 
 
HOW WERE PRIMITIVE WEIGHT UNITS FIXED? 177 
 
 Those who wish to study the elaborate systems of later times 
 employed in India can consult the works of Colebrooke and 
 Thomas already referred to. 
 
 The legislators Manu, Y^jnavalkya, and Narada trace all 
 weights from the least visible quantity which they concur in 
 naming trasarenu and describing as the very small mote, "which 
 may be discovered in a sunbeam passing through a lattice." 
 Writers on medicine proceed a step further, and affirm that a 
 trasarenu contains 30 paramdnu or atoms. The legislators 
 above-named proceed from the trasarenu as follows : 
 
 8 trasarenus = 1 liJcshd, or minute poppy-seed. 
 
 3 likshds = 1 raja-sarshapa, or black mustard-seed. 
 
 3 raja-sarshapas = 1 gaura-sarshapa, or white mustard-seed. 
 6 gaura-sarshapas= 1 yava, or middle-sized barley-corn. 
 3 yavas = 1 Jcrishnala, or seed of the gunjd. 
 
 But as we want to learn what was the actual usage of the 
 Hindus, instead of dealing with the mere theoretic statements of 
 late authors, I shall at once quote in full the tables given in 
 the Lilavati of Brahmegupta, who wrote his Algebra and Arith- 
 metic about 600 A.D.' 
 
 Money (by tale). Twice ten cowries''' are a cdcCni; four of 
 these are a pdna, sixteen of which must here be considered as 
 a dramma, and in like manner a nishkd, as consisting of sixteen 
 of these. 
 
 Weight. A gunjd (or seed of Abrus), is reckoned equal to 
 two barley-corns (yavas). A valla is two gunjas, and eight of 
 these are a dharana, two of which make a yadyanaca. In like 
 manner one dhataca is composed of fourteen vallas. 
 
 Half ten gunjas axe called a masha by such as are conversant 
 with the use of the balance; a karsha contains sixteen of what 
 
 1 Algebra with Arithmetic and Mensuration translated from the Sanskrit of 
 Brahmegupta and Bhasoara by H. T. Colebrooke (London, 1817). 
 
 '' Down almost to the present day a, system of currency, similar to that 
 shown in the Lilavati prevailed in Assam. "Gold continues to pass current 
 in small uncoined round balls, usually weighing one Tola," there was a silver 
 coinage also, and cowries passed as money. W. Robinson, Descriptive Account 
 of Assam, pp. 249 and 267 (London, 1841). 
 
 12 
 
178 HOW WEEE PRIMITIVE WEIGHT UNITS FIXED ? 
 
 are called mashas, a pala four karshas. A karsha of gold is 
 named suvarna. 
 
 This is quite in harmony with the weight of gold as given 
 by the legislators : 
 
 5 krishnalas or raktikas = 1 indsha. 
 
 16 mdshas = 1 karsha, aksha, tolaka, or suvarna. 
 
 4 karshas or suvarnas = 1 ^^aZa or nishka. 
 
 10 paZas = 1 dharana of gold. 
 
 Yajnavalkya adds that according to some 5 suvarnas = 
 1 paZa. 
 
 All the authorities seem agreed in regarding the term 
 suvarna as peculiar to gold, for which metal it is also a name. 
 
 We learn thus that the Hindu standards were fixed by 
 means of natural seeds, and at no period do they, clever mathe- 
 maticians as they were, seem to have made any effort at ob- 
 taining a mathematical basis for their metric systems. 
 
 We also observe that the weight known as the suvarna or 
 gold weight par excellence is the weight of a karsha or 80 gunjds, 
 which, if we take the gunjd = 1'75 grains Troy, gives the weight 
 of the suvarna as 140 grains. I have already (p. 127) taken the 
 original Hindu gold unit as not far from this amount. From 
 the Lilavati we may now with little misgiving assume it to 
 have been such. 
 
 Lastly, let us observe that the barley-corn appears as 
 the basis of the system in the tables of Brahmegupta and 
 Bhascara, although the raktika evidently overmasters it in the 
 course of time. This is very interesting, for it indicates that 
 the Hindus had learned the art of weighing in a comparatively 
 northern region, where barley was the chief cereal under culti- 
 vation. If the system had been invented in the more southern 
 parts of India, the grain of rice, the staple of life in the southern 
 regions, would certainly have appeared as the sub-multiple of 
 the raktika, instead of the barley. As a matter of fact, rice- 
 grains seem to have been occasionally used locally, for Cole- 
 brooke remarks that " it is also said that the raktika is equal 
 in weight to four grains of rice in the husk." This supposition 
 is completely in accord with what we found in Persia, where 
 
HOW WERE PRIMITIVE WEIGHT UNITS FIXED? 179 
 
 the modem weight system for gold, silver and medicine runs 
 thus : 
 
 3 gendum dsho (barley-corn) = 1 nashod. 
 
 4 nashod (a kind of pea, lupin ?) = 1 d^mg. 
 
 6 dung = 1 niiscaP. 
 
 Although the niiscal and habba denote Arabic influence, we 
 may, without straining probabilities, conjecture that the use of 
 the barley-corn here as well as in India, where we found it at 
 a period anterior to Muhammadan conquest, indicates that in 
 Persia it existed likewise from the earliest times. The close 
 relationship between the ancient Hindus and ancient Persians 
 makes it all the more likely. It is also pointed out that 
 formerly the nashod was divided into three instead of four 
 grains. As the Arabs divide their karat into four habbas, it is 
 all the more likely that the 3 barley-corns = 1 nashod belong 
 to the ancient system. 
 
 The Arab weight system is based on the grain of wheat, 
 four of which make a karat (the seed of the carob or St John's 
 Bread)''. Occasionally in the Arab writers mention is made of a 
 karat divided into 3 habbas". The weight of the karat remains 
 unchanged, but the grains in this case are barley grains, since, 
 as we shall see presently, 3 grains of barley are equal to 4 grains 
 of wheat (-063 x 3 = 4-047 x 4). 
 
 It will now be most convenient for us to begin in the 
 extreme west, and once more from that work back towards 
 the coast of the Aegean Sea, in which our chief interest must 
 always be centred. 
 
 Whether the Kelts of Ireland had any indigenous weight 
 system or not, we have no direct evidence, although we do 
 know as a fact that when Caesar landed in Kent he found the 
 Britons employing coins of gold and bronze, and bars (or ac- 
 cording to some MSS. rings) of iron adjusted to a fixed weight. 
 However the earliest Irish documents reveal that people using 
 
 1 Martini, Metrologia, p. 770. Formerly the nashod = 3 habbi of '063 gram 
 which is just the weight of the barley grain, whereas -047 the weight assigned to 
 the gendum is that of a grain of wheat. 
 
 ' Queipo, Bssai siir les Systemes Mitriques et Monetaires des anciens peupJes 
 I. 360 (Paris, 1859). 
 
 12—2 
 
180 HOW WERE PRIMITIVE WEIGHT UNITS FIXED ? 
 
 a system of weights for silver directly borrowed from the older 
 Roman system (although it is likely that they had a native 
 standard for gold). As the solidus and denarius became the 
 chief units of Europe from the time of Constantine the Great 
 (336 A.D.), the Irish probably received their system at an earlier 
 date. 
 
 1 unga (uncia) = 24 screapalls (scripula). 
 
 1 screapall = Spingiuns. 
 
 1 pingiun = 8 grains of wheat' 
 
 When we pass to England, the very word grain which we 
 employ to express our lowest weight unit, would of itself 
 suggest that originally some kind of grain or seed was employed 
 by our forefathers in weighing, but as the grain in use among 
 us is the grain Troy, and as we have not yet learned its origin, 
 it will not do to argue vaguely from etymology. But a little 
 enquiry soon brings us to a time when the grain Troy did not 
 as yet form the basis of English weights, and when a far simpler 
 method of fixing the weight of the king's coinage was in vogue. 
 It was ordained by 12 Henry VII. ch. v. "that the bushel is to 
 contain eight gallons of wheat, and every gallon eight pounds 
 of wheat, and every pound twelve ounces of Troy weight, and 
 every ounce twenty sterlings, and every sterling to be of the 
 weight of thirty-two grains of wheat that grew in the midst 
 of the ear of wheat according to the old laws of this land^." 
 Going backwards we find that in 1280 (8 Edward I.) the penny 
 was to weigh 24 grains, which by weight then appointed were 
 as much as the former 32 grains of wheat. By the Statute 
 De Ponderibus, of uncertain date but put by some in 1265, it 
 was ordained that the penny sterling should weigh 32 grains of 
 wheat, round and dry, and taken from the midst of the ear. 
 Going back a step still further we find that by the Laws of 
 Ethelred, every penny weighed 32 grains of wheat'', and as the 
 pennies struck by King Alfred weigh 24 grains Troy, we may 
 assume without hesitation that they were struck on the same 
 
 1 Ancient Lmos of Ireland, Vol. iv. 335, (Book of Aicill), O'Douovan's 
 Supplement, s.v. pingiun. 
 
 ' Euding, Annals of the Coinage of Great Britain, ii. 58. 
 Euding, op. cit. i. 369, 
 
 3 
 
HOW WERE PRIMITIVE WEIGHT UNITS FIXED ? 181 
 
 Standard of 32 grains of wheat. Thus from Alfred (871—901) 
 down to Henry VII. (1485—1509), we find the penny fixed by 
 this primitive method, and the actual weight of the coins, as 
 tested by the balance at the present day, affords proof positive 
 of the method. 
 
 But all the standards of mediaeval Europe (with the excep- 
 tion of the Irish) were based on the gold solidus of Oonstantine 
 the Greats The solidus (itself weighing 72 grains Troy or 
 j\ of the Roman pound) was divided into 24 siliquae. The 
 siliqua, or as the Greeks called it keration (Kepdriov, from 
 which comes our word carat), was the seed of the carob, or as 
 it is often called, St John's Bread (Geratonia siliqua L). Thus 
 the lowest unit in the Roman system, as it is usually given, 
 is found to be the seed of a plant. The same holds of the 
 Greek system, for the drachma is described as containing 18 
 kerata or keratia, whilst according to others "it contains three 
 grammata, but the gramma contains two obols and the obol 
 contains three kerata, and the keras contains four wheat grains^." 
 From this we see that the keration or siliqua was further re- 
 duced to 4 sitaria, or grains of wheat, whilst from another 
 ancient table of weights' we learn that the siliqua likewise 
 equals 3 barley-corns (siliqua grana ordei Hi). Hence it ap- 
 pears that 3 barley-corns = 4 wheat grains. Thus both Greek 
 and Roman systems just like the English and Irish take as 
 their smallest unit a grain of corn. This also throws important 
 light on the origin of that mysterious thing, the Troy grain. 
 We saw above (8 Edward I.) that at the time of its introduction 
 into England that 24 grains Troy = 32 grains of wheat, that is 
 the Troy grain stands to wheat grain as 3 : 4. But as we have 
 just seen that the siliqua = 3 barley-corns, and also = 4 wheat- 
 corns, it follows that 3 barley-corns = 4 wheat-corns. And as 
 3 Troy grains = 4 wheat-corns, it likewise follows that 3 Troy 
 grains = 3 barley-corns, or in other words, the barley-corn and 
 
 ' Marquardt, Rom. Staatsverwaltung, ii. p. .SO. 
 
 ^ Fragm. ap. Hultsch, Metrol. Script, i. 248, tj Si Spax^T) xipara it]'. dWoi Si 
 "Kiyovciv ^« ypaij,/xd,s Tpeis...Tb ypd/xna 6po\ois /3'. 6 Si lijSoXis Kepara y'. ri Si 
 Kipanov ?X" <TiTapM S' . 
 
 3 Hultsch, Op. cit. II. 128. 
 
182 HOW WERE PRIMITIVE WEIGHT UNITS FIXED ? 
 
 Troy grain are the same thing. It thus appears that the Troy 
 grain is nothing more than the barley-corn, which was used as 
 the weight unit in preference to the grain of wheat in some 
 parts of the Eoman empire. Furthermore this relation between 
 barley-corns and wheat-corns can be proved to be a fact of 
 Nature. In September, 1887, 1 placed in the opposite scales of 
 a balance 32 grains of wheat " dry and taken from the midst of 
 the ear," and 24 grains of barley taken from ricks of com grown 
 in the same field at Fen Ditton, near Cambridge, and I thrice 
 repeated the experiment ; each time they balanced so evenly 
 that a half grain weight turned the scale. The grain of Scotch 
 wheat weighs '047 gram, the Troy grain = '064, "047 x 4 = 188, 
 •064 X 3 = 192. Practically 4 wheat grains = 3 Troy grains. 
 
 Before passing from the Greek and Roman standards I 
 may add that even higher denominations than the siliqua were 
 expressed by the seeds of plants. The Romans made the 
 lupin {hqnnus) = 2 siliqiiae and under its Greek name of 
 thermos {Oep/j,6v), it was assigned a like value (Metrol. Script. I. 
 81). In the Carmen de Ponderibus (Metrol. Script, ii. 16), 6 
 grains of pulse (grana lentis) are made equal to 6 siliqiiae, 
 and a like number of grains of spelt are given a similar value. 
 
 We next advance towards the East and take up the Semitic 
 systems. We have already had occasion to touch upon that of 
 the Arabs when dealing with the modem Persians. " There can 
 be little doubt," says Queipo (i. 360), " that the Arab system of 
 weight was based on the grain of wheat." The habba was their 
 smallest unit. Four habbas are equal to 1 karat, the latter of 
 course representing the keration or siliqua, and the former the 4 
 sitaria or wheat-graiiw, which we saw were its equivalent. This 
 is the most ordinary value given to the karat in Makrizi and the 
 other Arabic writers on Metrology, but occasionally we find the 
 karat made equal to only 3 grains, which of course are barley- 
 corns. We saw above that in the Persian system the nashod was 
 formerly divided into 4 habbi of '048 gram (which is plainly the 
 weight of the wheat-grain), whilst now it is divided into 3 grains 
 each of '063 which represents the barley-corn, or in other words 
 the Troy grain of '064 gram. Of course the objection might 
 be raised that as the Arabs had borrowed their higher de- 
 
ttOW WERE PRIMITIVE WEIGHT UlflTS FIXED ? 183 
 
 nominations such as the dirhem (Bpa^M) and dinar (denarius, 
 Srjvdpiov), from the Greeks and Romans, and as their standard 
 weight the mithkal is nothing more than the sextula or ^ of 
 the Roman ounce, employed in the eastern Empire under the 
 name of exagion (e^dyiov, whence comes the saggio of Marco 
 Polo), so too their wheat-corns and barley-corns were not of 
 their own devising, but likewise adventitious. After what we 
 have seen above (p. 166) to be the practice of primitive 
 people in the selling of gold, a traffic in which the Arabs had 
 been engaged for many ages, it would seem hardly necessary 
 to reply to such an argument, but as a more complete answer 
 can be given in the course of the last portion of this enquiry, we 
 shall deal with it in that place. 
 
 We now come to the Assyrians themselves, from the 
 discovery of whose weights in the shape of lions and ducks, 
 the whole modern theory of a scientific origin for all the weight 
 standards of the Greeks as well as Asiatics and Egyptians has 
 had its origin. But even within this sacred precinct of a priori 
 metrology the irrepressible grain of corn springs up vigorously, 
 although almost choked by the abundant crop of tares which 
 have been sown around it. If we find that a Semitic people, 
 who were the ancients of the earth before Pelops passed from 
 Asia into Greece, or Romulus had founded his Asylum, em- 
 ployed the wheat grain as their lowest weight unit, we may 
 then well argue that ages before the birth of the Prophet and 
 the Arab conquest of Egypt and Syria, the Semitic folks 
 employed grains of corn to form their lowest weight unit. 
 
 M. Aures^ a well-known Assyrian metrologist, has recently 
 set forth the Assyrian system in its latest and most advanced 
 stage. Following the veteran Assyriologist, M. Oppert, he finds 
 that the Assyrians used a denomination lower than the obol. 
 In the Museum of the Louvre there is a small Assyrian weight 
 of the "duck" kind, which bears on its base the Assyrian 
 character of 22 grains ^. The ideogram translated grain is 
 evidently meant to represent some kind of corn with a rounded 
 end. The weight of this object is -95 gram (14f grains 
 
 1 Recueil de travaux relatifs a la Philologie et V Archeohgie Egyptienne (t 
 Assyrienne, Vol. x. laso. 4, p. 157. 
 
184 HOW WERE PRIMITIVE WEIGHT UNITS FIXED ? 
 
 Troy). The weight is a f obol, and therefore 30 grains went 
 to the obol. This is the obol of the heavy Assyrian system, 
 of which we shall presently speak. For the sake of clearness, 
 I take M. Aures' table. 
 
 30 grains = 1 obol. 
 
 6 obols = 1 drachm. 
 
 2 drachms = 1 shekel. 
 10 drachms = 1 " stone." 
 60 „ =1 light mina. 
 
 For our present purpose it is quite sufficient to call atten- 
 tion to the fact that this grain which forms the lowest unit 
 of the Assyrian scale weighs "042 gram ('95 -=r 22'5) which is 
 a very close approximation to the weight of the wheat-grain 
 (■047). Making allowance for some loss which the weight may 
 have sustained, it seems impossible to doubt that we have here 
 the wheat-grain being used to form the smallest unit as it is in 
 the modern Arabic system. The double obol of the Assyrians 
 weighs 30 grains ; we shall also find that the Hebrew gerdh or 
 obol (twenty of which made a shekel), weighed exactly 15 gruins 
 of wheaif that is the Hebrew gerdh is the light obol which stood 
 side by side with the heavy obol of 30 grains in the Assyrian 
 system. Let us treat the matter from a slightly different point 
 of view : As the light Assyrian obol contained 16 Assyrian 
 grains, the light shekel contained 180 Assyrian grs. But as we 
 know that this light Assyrian shekel weighed 8"4 grams, or 131 
 grains Troy, and as we know that the Troy grain is really the 
 barley-corn and likewise that 3 barley-corns = 4 wheat grains, 
 it is obvious that 131 grains Troy =175 wheat grs. nearly, a 
 very close approximation to the 180 Assyrian grs. Again as 
 180 Assyrian grs. = 8'4 grams, the Assyrian grain weighed 
 •046 gram, that is almost exactly the weight of a wheat grain 
 ('047 gram). 
 
 But let us see for a moment in what fashion M. Aures 
 accounts for the presence of corn-grains in a system so elabo- 
 rately scientific as he and his school maintain. 
 
 Starting as usual with the old assumption that all weight 
 standards come from the measures of capacity and all measures 
 
HOW WERE PKIMITIVE WEIGHT UNITS FIXED ? 185 
 
 of capacity in their turn are derived from the linear measures, 
 he proceeds thus : The Assyrian ideogram which represents 
 tribute, likewise represents talent. Tribute being paid in corn, 
 no doubt the idea of weight first arose as the people carried 
 their quota of com on their backs to the receipt of custom. 
 They accordingly weighed the measure (bar), which contained 
 the proper amount of corn and took it as their weight unit, and 
 then proceeded to make subdivisions of it. When their weight 
 system was thus fixed, for convenience instead of going to the 
 trouble of adjusting weights they took .30 grains of corn which 
 would be just equivalent to the weight of an obol. After the 
 many historical instances quoted in the preceding pages in 
 which the methods of appraising the value of corn and other 
 dry commodities have been set out, and also the manner in 
 which corn grains have been employed for fixing the higher 
 standard, as for instance in the adjustment of the English 
 bushel in the reign of Henry VII., the reader will feel that 
 M. Aures has simply inverted the true order of events, and that 
 as we found the natives of Annam and the Malays of the Indian 
 Archipelago making their first essay in weighing by means of 
 a grain of maize, or rice, or padi, so the ancient inhabitants of 
 Mesopotamia made their first beginning, and as we have found 
 everywhere that gold, the most precious of objects, was the 
 first thing to be weighed, and as it only existed in small quan- 
 tities, thus requiring but a very small unit of weight, so the 
 Assyrians likewise began to weigh gold first of all, employing 
 the natural seeds of corn, and only in process of time arrived at 
 higher units by multiplying the smaller. 
 
 To all the evidence collected from Asia and Europe we can 
 likewise add a fact of great importance from Africa. We saw 
 that it was highly probable that the Carthaginians traded for 
 gold to the West Coast of Africa, and beyond all reasonable 
 doubt the natives of the Gold Coast have for ages been ac- 
 quainted with that metal. Now it can be proved that these 
 peoples, whilst employing no weights for any other mercantile 
 transaction, used the seeds of certain plants for weighing their 
 gold; thus Bosman writing two centuries ago says, "Having 
 treated of gold at large, I am now obliged to say something 
 
186 HOW WERE tBIMlTlVE WEIGHT ItNltS FIXED ? 
 
 concerning the gold weights, which are either pounds, marks, 
 
 ounces or angels We use here another kind of weights 
 
 which are a sort of beans, the least of which are red spotted 
 with black and called Dambas ; twenty-four of them amount to 
 an angel, and each of them is reckoned two stiver weights; the 
 white beans with black spots or those entirely black are heavier 
 and accounted four stiver weights: these they usually call 
 Tacoes, but there are some which weigh half or a whole gilder, 
 but are not esteemed certain weights, but used at pleasure and 
 often become instruments of fraud. Several have believed that 
 the negroes only used wooden weights, but that is a mistake ; 
 all of them have cast weights either of copper or tin, which 
 though divided or adjusted in a manner quite different to ours; 
 yet upon reduction agree exactly with them^". 
 
 I am informed by Mr Quayle Jones, Chief Justice of 
 Sierra Leone, that at the present day, a seed called the Taku 
 (with a black spot) is employed by the natives of the Gold 
 Coast for weighing gold. He also tells me that small quantities 
 of gold are measured by a quill in ordinary dealings in the 
 market^ I learn from another private source that 6 Takus = 
 1 ackie (20 ackies = 1 ounce). From Bosman's equating the 
 bean with the red spot to 2 stiver- weights, we can deduce its 
 weight as 2 grs. troy; this result combined with the colour of 
 the bean would make us a priori conclude that the Damba was 
 the Ahrus precatorius, so familiar to us already under its Hindu 
 name oi ratti. 
 
 Here we have a primitive people with a weight system of 
 their own based on the Damba and Taku, just as the Hindu 
 is based on the ratti, and here too we have another proof that 
 the first of all articles to be weighed is gold. From Bosman 
 we also learn that gold in small quantities was not always 
 weighed, for he says of the inferior gold which was mixed with 
 
 ' Bosman, Guinea, Letter VI, [Pinkerton's Voyages, Vol. xyi. p. 374). 
 
 2 Althougli I have made many enquiries and Dr Thiselton Dyer of Kew has 
 taken much trouble in the matter, I am unable to give the reader the botanical 
 names of the Taku and Damba. Dr Dyer thinks the Damba is our old friend 
 the Abrus precatorius, the Indian ratti, confirming the opinion I had previously 
 formed from its weight. These seeds are commonly known as crabs' eyes. 
 
HOW WERE PRIMITIVE WEIGHT UNITS FIXED ? 187 
 
 silver or copper, that it is cast into fetiches (small grotesque 
 figures). " These fetiches are cut into small bits by the negroes 
 of one, two, or three farthings. The negroes know the exact value 
 of these bits so well at sight, that they never are mistaken, and 
 accordingly they sell them to each other without weighing as 
 we do coined moneys" This recalls the practice as regards 
 silver among the Tibetans at the present day. 
 
 Crossing to the eastern side of Africa we find the natives of 
 Madagascar employing a system, the basis of which is a grain 
 of rice. " The Malagasy have no circulating medium of their 
 own. Dollars are known more or less throughout the island : 
 but in many of the provinces trade is carried on principally by 
 an exchange of commodities. The Spanish dollar, stamped with 
 the two pillars, bears the highest value. For sums below a 
 dollar the inconvenient method is resorted to in the interior, of 
 weighing the money in every case. Dollars are cut up into 
 small pieces, and four iron weights are used for the half, quarter, 
 eighth, and twelfth of a dollar. Below that amount, divisions 
 aj-e effected by combinations of the four weights, and also by 
 means of grains of rice, even down so low as one single grain — 
 "Vary vray venty," one plump grain, valued at the seven 
 hundred and twentieth part of a dollar'''. The grain of rice 
 therefore weighs ^ gr. troy ('036 gram). As gold is not found 
 in Madagascar' the natives could not weigh it first of all things ; 
 but they have carried out the principle of taking silver, the 
 most precious article they possessed, as the first object to be 
 weighed. 
 
 In this chapter, therefore, we have sought the method by 
 which weight standards are fixed among primitive and semi- 
 civilized peoples ; we have studied the system or systems of 
 China, Cochin-China, Cambodia, Laos and the great Islands of 
 the Indian Ocean. Everywhere we have received the self-same 
 answer, everywhere the lowest unit is nothing more than a 
 natural seed or grain. We found in two places in the area 
 
 ^ Op. cit. 373. " The fetiches they oast in moulds made of a black and 
 heavy earth into what form they please.'' (p. 867.) 
 ' EUis, History of Madagascar, i. p. 335. 
 ' Op. cit. 1. p. 6. 
 
188 HOW WERE PRIMITIVE WEIGHT UNITS FIXED? 
 
 studied, amongst the Tapaks of Annam and the Malays of 
 Sumatra, the art of weighing in its earliest infancy; only one 
 product, gold, as yet being weighed, and the weight unit em- 
 ployed for it being a grain of rice or maize. We found that 
 this smallest natural unit of gold was amongst the Bahnars 
 equated to the smallest unit of barter in use among them, the 
 hoe, whilst their highest unit was the buffalo; and that by a 
 simple process based on the known relation existing in value 
 between the hoe, the mule, the jar, and the buffalo, there was 
 no difficulty in arriving empirically at the exact value in gold 
 of a buffalo. We found also that the two higher units of 
 weight the picul, and the catty, which in almost every case were 
 found to be confined to the ordinary merchandise, were beyond 
 reasonable doubt not originally multiples of the lower the tael, 
 but were really natural units obtained by a totally different 
 process ; the picul being the amount which an average man can 
 conveniently carry on his back, the catty, as seen especially in 
 the case of the neal of Cambodia, being nothing more than the 
 cocoa-nut shell used, as the ordinary measure of capacity, as a 
 gourd of a certain kind is employed at Zanzibar, as the hen's egg 
 was employed by the Hebrews and also by the ancient Irish, as 
 the cochlea or mussel shell was taken by the Romans as the basis 
 of their measures of capacity, and as possibly the gourd itself 
 under its name of Kyathos formed the lowest unit of capacity 
 among the Greeks. We saw clearly that the catty has never 
 become a weight-unit for precious metals among the Chinese, 
 Annamites or Cambodians; the first named never having used 
 any higher unit for such purpose than a bar of ten taels, and at 
 the present day for the most part contenting themselves with the 
 tael or ounce, whilst the two latter still use the nSn or bar with 
 its subdivisions into 10 denhs, or in other words, use as their 
 highest monetary unit the tenfold of the tael or ounce. We 
 likewise found that in Annam among the less advanced peoples 
 there was considerable evidence to show that the bat or tical 
 was originally the highest unit used for gold, and that this name 
 bat was applied to weights of different amount; thus the 
 chi which in commercial weight is only the quarter of a bat, 
 is itself called the gold bat. The bat itself was the third 
 
HOW WERE PRIMITIVE WEIGHT UNITS FIXED? 189 
 
 of the tael. We also found the bar of silver, the common 
 monetary unit at the present moment, equated to the buffalo, 
 the common unit of barter among the Bahnars, and finally we 
 had a distinct tradition that not so long ago the wild tribesmen 
 who win the gold dust from the sands of their native brooks 
 did not as yet even weigh the metal by means of the grains 
 of maize which are now employed, but that they measured 
 off a small rod of gold an inch long as the equivalent of a 
 buffalo. 
 
 From all these facts it seems easy to trace the history of 
 the development of weight standards in Further Asia; the 
 first stage in trafficking in gold seems to be one purely by 
 measure, then comes that of weighing by means of grains of 
 corn, the weight in gold of one or more grains of com being 
 taken in the ordinary way of barter like other articles in the 
 common scale of exchange. A multiple of the higher unit the 
 bat was formed, possibly based on the slave as the multiple 
 of the buffalo. This multiple is bhreefold of the bat, in that re- 
 spect offering a strange analogy to the gold talent of Sicily, 
 Magna Graecia, and Macedonia, which is the threefold of the 
 Homeric ox-unit, and which, as I have conjectured, may have 
 represented the value of a slave, as we certainly know as a fact 
 that the highest unit in the Irish system, the cumhal, which 
 represented the value of three cows or three ounces of silver, 
 was neither more nor less than an ancilla (or ordinary slave- 
 woman): the tenfold of this tael was the highest unit employed 
 for either gold or silver by the most advanced peoples in this 
 region, and is very well known as the nSn or bar. All other goods 
 were long appraised by measurement, the lowest unit of capacity 
 being the cocoa-nut or the joint of the bamboo, the former 
 knovm certainly to the Cambodians, the latter to the Chinese, 
 whilst both are equally familiar to the Malays. The weight of 
 the contents of the bamboo or cocoa-nut was presently taken, the 
 standard employed being the tael, or highest unit yet employed 
 for the precious metals. The weight of the contents would 
 depend on the nature of the substance or liquid employed, for 
 instance rice or some other kind of grain, or water. Thus 
 the Chinese equate their catty to 16 taels ; no doubt too 
 
190 HOW WERE PRIMITIVE WEIGHT UNITS FIXED? 
 
 convention came in at a later stage, and even though the 
 contents might not actually weigh 16 taels, it was found con- 
 venient for practical purposes to regard some suitable mul- 
 tiple of the tael, such as 16, as the legal weight of the catty. 
 A similar process was carried out in the case of the picul in 
 the more advanced communities; a load was equated to the 
 most convenient multiple of the catty, and as it was found 
 that 100 catties gave a sufficiently near approximation to the 
 ordinary load which a man could carry on his back, 100 catties 
 were made the legal contents of the picul of trade. 
 
 We also learned how currency in baser metals such as 
 copper or iron takes its origin. The history of the ordinary 
 copper cash of the Chinese, which can be clearly traced step by 
 step, brings us back to a time when a bronze knife, one of the 
 most requisite articles of daily life, formed the ordinary small 
 currency of the Chinese, just as the Greek obolos originally was 
 an actual spike made of copper or iron, and just as the Bahnars 
 of Annam still use the hoe as their lowest monetary denomina- 
 tion, an implement likewise similarly employed by the Chinese 
 at an early period, as miniature hoes at one time used as 
 true currency put beyond doubt. We also saw the negroes of 
 Central Africa employing iron made into pieces ready to be cut 
 into two hoes, and we also found those on the West Coast of 
 Africa and the Hottentots employing bars of iron in a raw state, 
 as a kind of currency. We also saw one most important feature 
 possessed by all those in common, viz. the fact that in the de- 
 termination of the value of the bar, the ingot, the piece of iron 
 made in the shape of two hoes, and the bronze knife, not weight 
 but linear measurement based on the parts of the human body, 
 was the method invariably employed. 
 
 We then advanced to Western Asia and Europe and found 
 everywhere alike the weight standards fixed by means of the 
 seeds of plants. The process likewise was made perfectly plain. 
 We did not find the highest denomination taken as the unit 
 and the lowest reached by a long process of subdivisions, and 
 finally for convenience sake described as consisting of so many 
 grains of com, as the brilliant French savant assumes in the 
 case of the Assyrians : on the contrary we found that the bushel 
 
HOW WERE PRIMITIVE WEIGHT UNITS FIXED ? 191 
 
 of Henry VII. was reached by first fixing the weight of the 
 penny sterling by means of 32 grains of wheat, round and dry 
 and "taken from the midst of the ear of wheat after the old laws 
 of the land." Again the Irish Kelts did not say that the unga 
 or ounce must contain so many screapalls, and each screapall so 
 many pingiuns, but they proceeded in quite the reverse way 
 first fixing the weight of the pingiun by eight grains of wheat. 
 We may then well assume that such too was the process among 
 Greeks, Romans, Arabs and Hindus. Brahmegupta, and the 
 legislators quoted above support this view by starting always 
 with the smallest unit. It is only when we come to the system 
 of Babylon we are asked to reverse the process, to admit that 
 the idea of weights began with corn, the very commodity of all 
 others which, according to all the instances previously quoted, 
 was the last to be valued by weight, and which even amongst 
 ourselves at this present moment can hardly be said to be re- 
 garded as an article appraised by weight. But furthermore if 
 the Assyrians regarded the Talent as their unit, and their lesser 
 denominations as its subdivisions, why did not the maker of the 
 weight mentioned above inscribe it as f obol, or by some other 
 term to indicate that it was essentially regarded as a fraction of 
 a higher denomination, and not as a multiple of a lower? But 
 the ancient Assyrian who made the weight must plainly have 
 regarded it in the latter light, for otherwise he would not have 
 engraved on it 22 grains J, actually resorting to the fraction of 
 a grain. The only reasonable explanation of his conduct is that 
 he was as firmly impressed with the idea that the basis of his 
 system was the grain of corn (wheat) as were Brahmagupta, or 
 Henry VII. 's parliament with the idea that the barley-corn and 
 wheat-corn were the bases of their respective systems. If the 
 objection be raised that the grains of corn were only devised in 
 days long after the scientific fixing of weight standards, my 
 answer is that if it was necessary to employ natural seeds as a 
 means of determining the accuracy of scientifically obtained 
 units, a fortiori it was necessary for mankind to have employed 
 such seeds as their first step in the establishing of a system of 
 weights. 
 
 No simpler idea connected with weight could have struck 
 
192 HOW WERE PRIMITIVE WEIGHT UNITS FIXED? 
 
 the primitive mind. The difficulty experienced by savages 
 in counting beyond 3 or 4 is met by them by the use of 
 counters. "We are all familiar with the use of pebbles or small 
 stones among the Greeks and Eomans. Our own word calcu- 
 late is simply an adaptation of the Latin calculare to count 
 by pebbles (calculi). Some nations, probably all, have been 
 unable to form abstract names for their numerals, and the name 
 of the concrete object which they habitually employed as a 
 counter has become firmly embedded as a suffix in the names 
 of their numerals. Thus the Aztec numerals end in tetl, a 
 pebble, because they employed small stones as counters. Simi- 
 larly the Malays whom we found weighing gold by means of 
 grains of padi employ that word as a numeral suffix, because 
 they employed grains of rice for their calculations or, to speak 
 more accurately, seminations. In the case of this people we 
 find coincident the most primitive forms of numeration and of 
 weighing, both processes being carried on by means of the same 
 simple instrument, which Nature put ready to hand in the corn 
 which formed their daily sustenance. 
 
 If any one still maintains that the Indian Islander or Tapak 
 of Annam learned the art of weighing by grains from the 
 Chinese, and would maintain that the latter either invented for 
 themselves or borrowed from Babylonia a scientifically devised 
 weight system, I will go a step further and try to produce 
 some evidence of the process by which weight standards are 
 arrived at, by seeking instances in a region so isolated as to be 
 beyond the reach of all suspicion of having borrowed from 
 Babylon. 
 
 From what I have said above, we cannot expect to find any 
 such community in the Old World. The New World on the 
 other hand supplies us with what we desire. When the 
 Spaniards under Cortes, conquered the Aztecs of Mexico, that 
 people, although in a high state of civilization, had as yet 
 no system of weights. In consequence of this want the 
 Spaniards experienced some difficulty in the division of the 
 treasure, until they supplied the deficiency with weights and 
 scales of their own manufacture. There was a vast treasure of 
 gold, which metal, found on the surface or gleaned from the 
 
HOW WERE PRIMITIVE WEIGHT UNITS FIXED? 193 
 
 beds of rivers, was cast into bars, or in the shape of dust made 
 part of the regular tribute of the southern provinces of the 
 empire. The traffic was carried on partly by barter, and partly 
 by means of a regulated currency of different values. This 
 consisted of transparent quills of gold dust, bits of tin cut in 
 the form of T, and bags full of cacao containing a specified 
 number of grains ^- 
 
 From this we get an insight into the first beginnings of 
 weights. Some natural unit (and by natural I mean some 
 product of nature of which all specimens are of uniform dimen- 
 sion) is taken, such as the quill used by the Aztecs. The 
 average-sized quill of any particular kind of bird presents a 
 natural receptacle of very uniform capacity. These quills of 
 gold-dust were estimated at so many bags containing a certain 
 number of grains. The step is not a long one to the day when 
 some one will balance in a simple fashion quills of gold dust 
 against seeds of cacao, and find how much gold is equal to a 
 nut. Nature herself supplies in the seeds of plants weight- 
 units of marvellous uniformity. If any one objects to my 
 assumption that the Aztecs were on the very verge of the 
 invention of a weight system, my answer is that another race 
 of America, whose political existence ceased under the same 
 cruel conditions as that of their Northern contemporaries, I mean 
 the Incas of Peru, who were in a stage of civilization almost 
 the same as that of the Aztecs, had already found out the art of 
 weighing before the coming of the Spaniards, although they 
 were inferior to the Mexicans in so far as they had not a well- 
 defined system of hieroglyphic writing, nor of currency such 
 as the latter possessed. Scales made of silver have been dis- 
 covered in Inca graves^ The metal of which they are made 
 shows that they were only employed for weighing precious com- 
 modities of small bulk. 
 
 Unfortunately I can find no record of weights having been 
 found along with the silver scales in the Inca graves. If the 
 weights were simply natural seeds, they would easily perish, or 
 even if perfect when the tombs were opened, would be simply 
 
 ' Presoott, Conquest of Mexico, p. 44. 
 2 Preseott, Pei-u, p. 56. 
 
 B. 13 
 
194 HOW WERE PBIMITIVE WEIGHT UNITS FIXED? 
 
 regarded as part of the ordinary supply of food placed with the 
 dead in the grave. But I forbear from laying the slightest 
 stress on negative evidence of such a kind. 
 
 But beyond doubt we have on the American continent, far 
 removed from connection with Asia, a series of facts closely 
 harmonising with what we have found in Further Asia, and also 
 among the peoples of Hither Asia, Europe and Africa. The 
 Aztecs are still measuring gold, but the Incas have invented the 
 balance. The Incas have no alphabet, the quipus as yet being 
 their greatest advance towards a means of keeping a record of the 
 past. It follows that it is possible for the human race to invent 
 a system of weighing before it has made any advance in letters 
 or science. Hence it is logical to infer that the civilized races 
 of Asia and Europe could have discovered a means of vireighing 
 gold long before the Chaldean sages made a single step in their 
 astronomical discoveries, or a single symbol of the cuneiform 
 syllabary had as yet been impressed on brick or tablet. 
 
 Weights of various grains. 
 
 Troy Grain 
 
 grammes 
 
 •064 
 
 Barley 
 
 •064 
 
 Wheat 
 
 •048 
 
 Eice 
 
 •036 
 
 Carob 
 
 •192 = 3 barley = 4 wheat 
 
 Lupin 
 
 •384 = 2 carobs 
 
 Maize (ordinary) 
 
 •128 = 2 barley 
 
 Eatti 
 
 •128 = 2 barley 
 
 Eye 
 
 •032 = i barley 
 
CHAPTER IX. 
 
 Statement and Criticism of the Old Doctrines. 
 
 Nee Babylonios 
 Tentaris numeros. 
 
 Hoe. Carm. i. 11. 2. 
 
 We now proceed to the statement and criticism of the 
 old doctrines of the origin of metallic currency and weight 
 standards. To enter into an elaborate account of the various 
 shades of doctrine held by the followers of Boeckh would be 
 useless and wearisome, for as they all alike are agreed in 
 starting from an arbitrary scientifically obtained unit, it 
 matters not as far as my object is concerned. Certain 
 metrologists lay down that Egypt borrowed her system from 
 Babylon, whilst others^ again declare that Egypt is the 
 true mother of weight standards, and this battle is raging 
 hotly at the present moment. Thus but recently Professor 
 Brugsch has written a vigorous article (in the Zeitschrift fiir 
 Ethnologie^) to prove that the Chaldeans bori-owed their system 
 from Egypt. But the Assyriologists were not prepared to 
 assent to a doctrine which placed the Babylonians in an inferior 
 position. Accordingly Dr C. F. Lehmann {Zeitschrift fur Eth- 
 nologie, 1889, p. 245 seqq.) has made an elaborate defence of the 
 original doctrine first propounded by Boeckh and developed 
 and expounded by Dr Brandis and Dr Hultsch. This Assyrio- 
 Egyptian struggle for pre-eminence has at present no im- 
 portance for our enquiry, as it is based almost entirely on d, 
 
 ' Nissen, " Grieohisehe und romische Metrologie " (Iwan Mailer's Handbuch 
 der classischen Alterthitmswissemchaft i. 663 seq. or separately, Nordlingen, 
 1886). 
 
 2 "Das iilteste Gewicht," 1889, pp. 1—9, 34—43. 
 
 13—2 
 
196 STATEMENT AND CRITICISM UF THE OLD DOCTKINES. 
 
 priori assumptions, although when we come eventually to deal 
 with the question of efforts at systematization which arose at a 
 later stage in the evolution of weight and measure standards, it 
 will be necessary for us to examine the respective claims. At 
 present we are engaged in searching for an historical basis, and 
 as both the Assyriologists and Egyptologists alike unite in 
 deriving all weights from a deliberate scientific attempt on the 
 part of a highly civilized people, they are perfectly agreed in 
 the principle, the soundness of which it is the object of the 
 present investigation to test. The ablest exponent in this 
 country of the German theory is Dr B. V. Head, who has given 
 an admirable summary of the position of that school in his 
 Introduction to his great work, Historia Numorum (p. xxviii.). 
 To ensure a fair statement of the doctrine for the reader, it will 
 be better for me to give here Mr Head's exposition in preference 
 to any summary of my own, as any statement by the critic of 
 the doctrine to be criticized is always liable to the suspicion of 
 being ex parte and consequently inadequate. Such a suspicion 
 is avoided by letting as far as possible our opponents state their 
 position in their own words. 
 
 " For many centuries before the invention of coined money 
 there can be no doubt whatever that goods were bought and 
 sold by barter pure and simple, and that values were estimated 
 among pastoral people by the produce of the land, and more 
 particularly in oxen and sheep. 
 
 " The next step in advance upon this primitive method of 
 exchange was a rude attempt at simplifying commercial brans- 
 actions by substituting for the ox and the sheep some more 
 portable substitute, either possessed of real or invested with an 
 arbitrary value. 
 
 "This transitional stage in the development of commerce 
 cannot be more accurately described than in the words of 
 Aristotle, 'As the benefits of commerce were more widely 
 extended by importing commodities of which there was a defi- 
 ciency, and exporting those of which there was an excess, the 
 use of a currency was an indispensable device. As the neces- 
 saries of Nature were not all easily portable, people agreed 
 for purposes of barter mutually to give and receive some 
 
STATEMENT AND CRITICISM OF THE OLD DOCTRINES. 197 
 
 article which, while it was itself a commodity, was practically 
 easy to handle in the business of life ; some such article as 
 iron or silver, which was at first defined simply by size and 
 weight, although finally they went further and set a stamp 
 upon every coin to relieve them from the trouble of weighing 
 it, as the stamp impressed upon the coin was an indication of 
 quantity.' {PolU. i. 6. 14—16, Trans. Welldon.) 
 
 " In Italy and Sicily copper or bronze in very early times 
 took the place of cattle as a generally recognized measure of 
 value, and in Peloponnesus the Spartans are said to have 
 retained the use of iron as a standard of value long after the 
 other Greeks had advanced beyond this point of commercial 
 civilization. 
 
 " In the East, on the other hand, from the earliest times 
 gold and silver appear to have been used for the settlement of 
 the transactions of daily life, either metal having its value more 
 or less accurately defined in relation to the other. Thus Abra- 
 ham is said to have been ' very rich in cattle, in silver and in 
 gold ' (Gen. xiii. 2, xxiv. 35), and in the account of his purchase 
 of the cave of Machpelah (Gen. xxiii. 16), it is stated that ' Abra- 
 ham weighed to Ephron the silver which he had named in the 
 audience of the sons of Heth, four hundred shekels of silver, 
 current with the merchants.' 
 
 " As there are no auriferous rocks or streams in Ghaldaea, we 
 must infer that the old Chaldaean traders must have imported 
 their gold from India by way of the Persian Gulf, in the ships 
 of Ur frequently mentioned in cuneiform inscriptions. 
 
 "But though gold and silver were from the earliest times 
 used as measures of value in the East, not a single piece of 
 coined money has come down to us of these remote ages, nor 
 is there any mention of coined money in the Old Testament 
 before Persian times. The gold and silver 'current with the 
 merchant ' were always weighed in the balance ; thus we read 
 that David gave to Oman for his threshing-floor [including 
 oxen and threshing instruments] 600 shekels of gold by weight 
 (1 Chron. xxi. 25). 
 
 " It is nevertheless probable that the balance was not called 
 into operation for every small transaction, but that little bars 
 
198 STATEMENT AND CRITICISM OF THE OLD DOCTRINES. 
 
 of silver and of gold of fixed weight, but without any official 
 mark (and therefore not coins) were often counted out by tale, 
 larger amounts being always weighed. Such small bars or wedges 
 of gold and silver served the purposes of a currency, and were 
 regulated by the weight of the shekel or the mina. 
 
 " This leads us briefly to examine the standards of weight 
 used for the precious metals in the East before the invention of 
 money. 
 
 " The metric systems of the Egyptians, Babylonians, and 
 Assyrians. 
 
 " The evidence afforded by ancient writers on the subject of 
 weights and coinage is in great part untrustworthy, and would 
 often be unintelligible were it not for the light which has been 
 shed upon it by the gold and silver coins, and bronze, leaden and 
 stone weights which have been fortunately preserved down to 
 our own times. It will be safer, therefore, to confine ourselves 
 to the direct evidence afforded by the monuments. 
 
 "Egypt, the oldest civilized country of the ancient world, first 
 claims our attention, but as the weight system which prevailed 
 in the Nile valley does not appear to have exercised any trace- 
 able influence upon the early coinage of the Greeks, the metro- 
 logy of Eg3rpt need not detain us long 
 
 "The Chaldaeans and Babylonians, as is well known, excelled 
 especially in the cognate sciences of arithmetic and astronomy. 
 On the broad and monotonous plains of Lower Mesopotamia, 
 says Professor Rawlinson, where the earth has little to suggest 
 thought or please by variety the ' variegated heaven,' ever 
 changing with the times and the seasons, would early attract 
 attention, while the clear sky, dry atmosphere, and level 
 horizon, would afford facilities for observations so soon as the 
 idea of them suggested itself to the minds of the inhabitants. 
 The records of these astronomical observations were inscribed 
 in cuneiform character on soft clay tablets, afterwards baked 
 hard and preserved in the royal or public libraries in the chief 
 cities of Babylonia. Large numbers of these tablets are now in 
 the British Museum. When Alexander the Great took Babylon, 
 it is recorded that there were found and sent to Aristotle a 
 
STATEMENT AND CRITICISM OF THE OLD DOCTRINES. 199 
 
 series of astronomical observations extending back as far as the 
 year B.C. 2234. Recent investigations into the nature of these 
 records render it probable that upon them rests the entire 
 structure of the metric system of the Babylonians. The day 
 and night were divided by the Babylonians into 24 hours, each 
 of 60 minutes, and each minute into 60 seconds — a method of 
 measuring time which has never been superseded, and which we 
 have inherited from Babylon, together with the first principles 
 of the science of astronomy. The Babylonian measures of 
 capacity and their system of weights were based, it is thought, 
 upon one and the same unit as their measures of time and 
 space, and as they are believed to have determined the length of 
 an hour of equinoctial time by means of the dropping of water, 
 so too it is conceivable that they may have fixed the weight of 
 their talents, their mina, and their shekel, as well as the size of 
 their measures of capacity, by weighing or measuring the 
 amounts of water, which had passed from one vessel into 
 another during a given space of time. Thus, just as an hour 
 consisted of 60 minutes and the minute of 60 seconds, so the 
 talent contained 60 minae, and the mina 60 shekels. The 
 division by sixties or sexagesimal system, is quite as character- 
 istic of the Babylonian arithmetic and system of weights and 
 measures, as the decimal system is of the Egyptian and the 
 modern French. And indeed it possesses one great advantage 
 over the decimal system, inasmuch as the number 60, upon 
 which it is based, is more divisible than 10. 
 
 "About 1300 years before our era the Assyrian empire came 
 to surpass in importance that of the Babylonians, but the 
 learning and science of Chaldaea were not lost, but rather trans- 
 mitted through Nineveh by means of the Assyrian conquests 
 and commerce to the north and west as far as the shores of 
 the Mediterranean Sea. Let us now turn to the actual monu- 
 ments. Some thirty years ago Mr Layard discovered and 
 brought home from the ruins of ancient Nineveh a number of 
 bronze lions of various sizes which may now be seen in the 
 British Museum. With them were also a number of stone 
 objects in the form of ducks^" 
 
 1 The whole series of these ancient weights was some years ago subject to 
 
200 STATEMENT AND CRITrCISM Oi' THE OLD DOCTRINES. 
 
 From this double series of weights Mr Head infers that 
 there were two distinct minae simultaneously in use during 
 the long period of time which elapsed between about B.C. 2000, 
 and B.C. 625. " The heavier of these two minae appears to have 
 been just the double of the lighter. Brandis is probably not 
 far from the mark in fixing the weight of the heavy mina at 
 1010 grammes, and that of the light at 505 grammes. 
 
 " It has been suggested that the lighter of these two minae 
 may have been peculiar to the Babylonian, and the heavier to 
 the Assyrian empire ; but this cannot be proved. But never- 
 theless it would seem that the use of the heavy mina was more 
 extended in Syria than that of the lighter, if we may judge 
 from the fact that most of the weights belonging to the system 
 of the heavy mina have in addition to the cuneiform inscription 
 an Aramaic one. 
 
 "The purpose which this Aramaic inscription served must 
 clearly have been to render the weight acceptable to the Syrian 
 and Phoenician merchants who traded backwards and forwards 
 between Assyria and Mesopotamia on the one hand, and the 
 Phoenician emporia on the other. 
 
 " The Phoenician traders. 
 
 "The Phoenician commerce was chiefly a carrying trade. 
 The richly embroidered stuffs of Babylonia and other products 
 of the East were brought down to the coasts, and then carefully 
 packed in chests of cedarwood in the markets of Tyre and Sidon, 
 whence they were shipped by the enterprising Phoenician 
 mariners to Cyprus, to the coasts of the Aegean, or even to the 
 extreme West. 
 
 " Hence the Phoenician city of Tyre was called by Ezekiel 
 (xxvii.) ' a merchant of the people for many isles.' 
 
 a careful process of weighing in a balance of precision \>y an officer of the 
 Standard Department and the result was published by Mr W. H. Chisholme in 
 the Ninth Annual Report of the Warden of the Standards 1874 — 5, where a com- 
 plete list of all of them may be found. 
 
 All the more important pieces had however been weighed many years before, 
 and it need only be stated that the results of the process of re-weighing under 
 more favourable conditions are in the main identical with those formerly 
 arrived at by Queipo and the late Dr Brandis. 
 
STATEMENT AND CRITICISM OF THE OLD DOCTRINES. 201 
 
 " But the Phoenicians in common with the Egyptians, the 
 Greeks and the Hebrews etc. with whom they dealt were at no 
 time without their own peculiar weights and measures upon 
 which they appear to have grafted the Assyrio-Babylonian 
 principal unit of account or the weight in which it was cus- 
 tomary to estimate values. This weight -^as the 60th part of 
 the manah or mina. 
 
 " The Babylonian sexagesimal system was foreign to Phoe- 
 nician habits. While therefore these people had no difficulty 
 in adopting the Assyrio-Babylonian 60th as their own unit of 
 weight or shekel, they did not at the same time adopt the 
 sexagesimal system in its entirety but constituted a new mina 
 for themselves consisting of 50 shekels' instead of 60. In esti- 
 mating the largest weight of all, the Talent, the multiplication 
 by 60 was nevertheless retained. Thus in the Phoenician 
 system as in that of the Greeks 50 shekels (Gk. staters) = 1 
 Mina, and 60 Minae or 3000 shekels or staters = 1 Talent. 
 
 " The particular form of shekel which appears to have been 
 received by the Phoenicians and Hebrews from the East was 
 the 60th part of the heavier of the two Assyrio-Babylonian 
 minae above referred to. The 60bh of the lighter for some 
 reason which has not been satisfactorily accounted for seems 
 to have been transmitted westwards by a different route, viz. 
 across Asia Minor, and so into the kingdom of Lydia. 
 
 " The Lydians. 
 
 "'The Lydians,' says E. Curtius {Hist. Gr. I. 76), 'became on 
 land what the Phoenicians were by sea, the mediators between 
 Hellas and Asia.' It is related that about the time of the 
 Trojan Wars and for some centuries afterwards, the country of 
 the Lydians was in a state of vassalage to the kings of Assyria. 
 But an Assyrian inscription informs us that Asia Minor, west of 
 the Halys, was unknown to the Assyrian kings before the time 
 of Assur-bani-apli, or Assurbanipal (circ. B.C. 666), who it is 
 stated received an embassy from Gyges, king of Lydia 'a 
 remote' country, of which Assurbanipal's predecessors had 
 never heard the name. Nevertheless that there had been some 
 
202 STATEMENT AND CRITICISM OF THE OLD DOCTRINES. 
 
 sort of connection between Lydia and Assyria in ancient times 
 is probable, though it cannot be proved. 
 
 " Professor Sayce is of opinion that the mediators between 
 Lydia in the west, and Assyria in the east, were the people 
 called Kheta or Hittites. According to this theory the northern 
 Hittite capital Carchemish (later Hierapolis) on the Euphrates, 
 was the spot where the arts and civilization of Assyria took the 
 form which especially characterises the early monuments of 
 Central Asia Minor. 
 
 " The year B.C. 1400 or thereabouts was the time of greatest 
 power of the nation of the Hittites, and if they were in reality 
 the chief connecting link between Lydia and Assyria it may 
 be inferred that it was through them that the Lydians received 
 the Assyrian weight, which afterwards in Lydia took the form 
 of a stamped ingot or coin. 
 
 " But why it was that the light mina rather than the heavy 
 one had become domesticated in Lydia must remain unex- 
 plained. We know however that one of the Assyrian weights 
 is spoken of in cuneiform inscriptions as the 'weight of Car- 
 chemish.' If then the modern hypothesis of a Hittite dominion 
 in Asia Minor turn out to be well founded, the weight of Gar- 
 chemish might by means of the Hittites have found its way to 
 Phrygia and Lydia, and as the earliest Lydian coins are regu- 
 lated according to the divisions of the Light Assyrian mina this 
 would probably be the one alluded to. 
 
 "From these two points then, Phoenicia on the one hand and 
 Lydia (through Carchemish), on the other, the two Babylonian 
 units of weight appear to have started westwards to the shores 
 of the Aegean sea, the heavy shekel by way of Phoenicia, the 
 lighter shekel by way of Lydia." 
 
 So far I have thought it but right to give Mr Head's ex- 
 position in extenso, that the enquirer may be enabled to fully 
 grasp the principles of the orthodox school, before we enter 
 on any criticism of them. I shall now treat more summarily 
 all that remains to be said. 
 
 Let us briefly state the peculiar doctrines of two leading 
 continental metrologists. The veteran Dr Hultsch derives all 
 standards of weight thus : The royal Babylonian cubit was 
 
STATEMENT AND CRITICISM OF THE OLD DOCTRINES. 203 
 
 based on the sun's apparent diameter ; the cube of this measure 
 gave the maris, the weight in water of one-fifth of which was 
 the royal Babylonian talent, which was divided into 60 manehs 
 {minae) and each mina in turn into 60 shekels. For silver and 
 gold however they formed their standard by takmg fifty shekels 
 to form a mina^: thus after elaborating with such care a 
 scientific system, they abandoned it as soon as they came to 
 deal with the precious metals. 
 
 M. Soutzo^ in a clever essay has maintained that all the 
 weight systems both monetary and commercial of Asia, Egypt, 
 Greece, come from one primordial weight the Egyptian iiten 
 (96 grammes), or from its tenth, the kat (9'60 grammes). He 
 ascribes the origin of these weights to an extremely remote 
 epoch not far perhaps from the time of the discovery of bronze 
 in Asia, and the invention of the first instruments for weighing: 
 he considers also that bronze by weight was the first money 
 employed in Asia, Egypt, and Italy, and that everywhere the 
 decimal system of numeration has preceded the sexagesimal. 
 
 The evidence which we have produced in the earlier part 
 of this work has I trust convinced the reader that gold, not 
 copper, was the first object to be weighed ; M. Soutzo's assump- 
 tion that the uten is the primordial unit is upset even for 
 the Egyptians themselves by the passage already cited from 
 Horapollo (p. 129). 
 
 The invention of coinage. 
 
 The evidence of both history and numismatics coincides 
 in making the Lydians the inventors of the art of coining 
 money. At first sight it may seem surprising that none of 
 the great peoples of the East, whose civilization had its first 
 beginning long ages before the periods at which our very 
 oldest records begin, should have developed coined money, ac- 
 quainted as they indubitably were with the precious metals, 
 both for ornament and exchange. But a little reflection shews 
 us that it has been quite possible for peoples to attain a high 
 
 I Metrologle^, p. 393. 
 
 ' Etalons ponderaux primitifs et liiigots monetaires {Bucharest, 1884), p. 49. 
 
204 STATEMENT AND CRITICISM OF THE OLD DOCTRINES. 
 
 degree of civilization without feeling any' need of what are 
 properly termed coins. Transactions by means of the scales 
 are comparatively simple, and as a matter of fact we shall find 
 hereafter that even after a coinage had been for centuries 
 established, men constantly had recourse to the balance in 
 monetary transactions, just as down to the present moment the 
 Chinese, who have enjoyed a high degree of culture for several 
 thousand years, still have no native currency but their copper 
 cash, foreign silver dollars being the only medium in the precious 
 metals, whilst all important monetary transactions are carried 
 on by the scales and weights. I may here likewise point out 
 incidentally that where the supply of the precious metals is 
 only sufficient to meet the demand for personal adornment, 
 the establishment of a coinage in those metals will naturally 
 be slow, whilst on the other hand where there is so abundant 
 a supply of the metals, that there is more than sufficient for 
 purposes of personal use, the tendency to produce a coinage will 
 be much greater. If we enquire what were the metalliferous 
 regions of Asia Minor, we at once find that Lydia above all 
 other countries was especially rich in gold, or rather a natural 
 alloy of gold and silver. The wealth of two Lydian kings, 
 Gyges and Croesus, which has been through the ages a 
 proverb consisted of vast quantities of this metal, which the 
 Greeks called electron {rjXeKrpov) or white gold (XeuKo? ■)(^pviT6<;, 
 Herodotus, i. 50). The ancients regarded it as almost a distinct 
 metal, doubtless because from their imperfect methods they 
 experienced the greatest difficulty in extracting the pure metal. 
 The pure gold in circulation in Asia Minor must have come 
 from the valley of the Oxus, or the Ural mountains. Thus 
 Sophocles speaks of " the electron of Sardis and the gold of Ind\" 
 Even in the time of Strabo (a.d. 21), the process was regarded 
 as so difficult that the great geographer thinks it worth while 
 to quote from Posidonius (flor. 90 B.C.), the description of how 
 the separation of the metals was effected (ill. 146). It is there - 
 
 1 Soph. Antig. 1038 seqq. 
 
 Kepdaiver, ifiiroXare rbv Tph^ SdpSewy 
 rjKiKTfiov, el ^oiXeirBe, Kal rbv 'Ivbmhv 
 Xpvaov. 
 
STATEMENT AND CRITICISM OF THE OLD DOCTBINES. 205 
 
 fore natural to find in Lydia, the land of gold, the first attempts 
 at coined money. 
 
 "So far as we have knowledge," says Herodotus', "the 
 Lydians were the first nation to introduce the use of gold and 
 silver coin." 
 
 This statement is fully borne out by the evidence of Xeno- 
 phanes'', and also by the coins themselves, although some 
 writers, e.g. Th. Mommsen^, have held that it was in the great 
 cities of Ionia, Phocaea and Miletus that money was first coined. 
 '' From the little we know of the character of this people (the 
 Lydians) we gather that their commercial instinct must have 
 been greatly developed by their geographical position and 
 surroundings, both conducive to frequent intercourse with the 
 peoples of Asia Minor, Orientals as well as Greeks." 
 
 About the time when the mighty Assyrian empire was 
 falling into decay, Lydia, under a new dynasty called the 
 Mermnadae, was entering upon a new phase of national life. 
 
 " The policy of these new rulers of the country was to extend 
 the power of Lydia towards the West, and to obtain possession of 
 towns on the coast. With this object Gyges (who, according to 
 the story told by Plato, was a shepherd who owed his good 
 fortune to the finding of a magic ring in an ancient tomb, 
 and who was the founder of the dynasty of the Mermnadae, 
 circ. B.C. 700) established a firm footing on the Hellespont, and 
 endeavoured to extend his dominions along the whole Ionian 
 coast. This brought the Lydians into direct contact with the 
 Asiatic Greeks. 
 
 " These Ionian Greeks had been from very early times in 
 constant intercourse, not always friendly, with the Phoenicians, 
 with whom they had long before come to an understanding 
 about numbers, weights, measures, the alphabet, and such like 
 matters, and from whom, there is reason to think, they had 
 received the 60th part of the heavy Assyrio-Babylonian mina 
 as their, unit of weight or stater. The Lydians on the other 
 hand had received, probably from Carchemish, the 60th of the 
 light mina. 
 
 > I. 94. ° Pollux, IX. 83. 
 
 3 Histoire de la Monnaie Eomaine, i. 15. 
 
206 STATEMENT AND CRITICISM OF THE OLD DOCTRINES. 
 
 " Thus then, when the Lydians in the reign of Gyges came 
 into contact and conflict with the Greeks, the two units of 
 weight, after travelling by different routes, met again in the 
 coast towns and river valleys of Western Asia Minor, in the 
 borderland between the East and the West. 
 
 "To the reign of Gyges, the founder of the new Lydian 
 empire as distinct from the Lydia of more remote antiquity, 
 may perhaps be ascribed the earliest essays in the art of coining. 
 The wealth of this monarch in the precious metals may be 
 inferred from the munificence of his gifts to the Delphic shrine, 
 consisting of golden mixing cups and silver urns, amounting to 
 a mass of gold and silver such as the Greeks had never before 
 seen collected together." This treasure was called the Gygadas, 
 and is described by Herodotus\ 
 
 " It is in conformity with the whole spirit of a monarch such 
 as Gyges, whose life's work it was to extend his empire towards 
 the West, and at the same time to hold in his hands the lines 
 of communication with the East, that from his capital Sardes, 
 situated on the slopes of Tmolus and on the banks of the 
 Pactolus, both rich in gold, he should send forth along the 
 caravan routes of the East and into the heart of Mesopotamia, 
 and down the river valleys of the West to the sea, his native 
 Lydian ore gathered from the washings of Pactolus and from 
 the diggings on the sides of Tmolus and Sipylus. 
 
 " This precious merchandize (if the earliest Lydian coins are 
 indeed his) he issued in the form of oval-shaped bullets or 
 ingots, officially sealed or stamped on one side as a guarantee 
 of their weight and value. For the eastern or land-trade the 
 light mina was the standard by which this coinage was re- 
 gulated, while for the western trade with the Greeks of the 
 coast the heavy mina was made use of, which from its mode of 
 transmission we may call the Phoenician, retaining the name 
 Babylonian only for the weight which was derived from the 
 banks of the Euphrates." 
 
 To prevent misapprehension, it may be advisable to mention 
 that the standards here termed Phoenician and Babylonian are 
 not to be confounded with the heavy and light shekels already 
 
 1 Herod, i. 14. 
 
STATEMENT AND CRITICISM OF THE OLD DOCTRINES. 207 
 
 mentioned, but are the standards derived from the latter 
 specially for silver, in the ways shown a little lower down. 
 
 Modern analysis of electrum from Tmolus shows that it 
 consists of 27 per cent, of silver and 73 per cent, of gold^ It 
 consequently stood to silver in a different relation from that 
 of pure gold. Thus while gold stood to silver as 13*3 : 1, 
 electrum would stand at 10 : 1 or thereabouts. Mr Head 
 considers that " this natural compound of gold and silver pos- 
 sessed some advantages for coining over gold. In the first 
 place it was more durable, harder, and less liable to injury and 
 waste from wear. In the second place it was more easily 
 obtainable, being a natural product; and in the third place, 
 standing as it did in the proportion of about 10 : 1 to silver, it 
 rendered needless the use of a different standard of weight for 
 the two metals, enabling the authorities of the mints to make 
 use of a single set of weights, and a decimal system easy of 
 comprehension and simple in practice" (p. xxxiv.). The second 
 of these reasons is probably the true one, the first being a good 
 example of the tendency of even the most able modern writers to 
 ascribe to early times ideas which are only the outcome of a far 
 later period. The idea of getting a metal which will be more 
 durable in circulation is purely modern, and not even received 
 by Orientals in modern times. Thus the gold mohurs of India 
 down to their latest issue were of pure gold, free from alloy (in 
 consequence of which they are still sought after by the native 
 Hindu goldsmiths in preference to the English sovereign, as the 
 addition of alloy makes the latter less easy to work up into 
 jewellery). 
 
 I allude to this here because we shall find in the course of 
 our enquiry that most of the errors into which metrologists 
 have fallen, are the consequence of their failing to recognize the 
 great gulf which is fixed between the habits and ideas of a 
 primitive community, slowly evolving principles which are now 
 part and parcel of the common heritage of civilization, and an 
 era like our own, when all progress is effected by the develop- 
 ment and application of scientific principles long since dis- 
 covered. 
 
 1 Hultsoh, Metrol.^ 579. 
 
208 STATEMENT AND CRITICISM OF THE OLD DOCTRINES. 
 
 Electrum was thus coined on the same standard as silver, 
 one talent, one mi7ia and one stater of electrum being con- 
 sequently equal to ten talents, ten minae, or ten staters of silver. 
 The weight of the electrum stater in each district would depend 
 therefore on the standard which happened to be in use there 
 for silver bullion, or silver in the shape of bars or oblong bricks, 
 the practice of the new invention of stamping or sealing metal 
 for circulation being in the iirst place only applied to the more 
 precious of the two metals, electrum representing in a small 
 compass a weight of uncoined silver ten times as bulky and 
 ten times as difficult of transport. 
 
 The invention was soon extended to pure gold and silver, 
 and there is good reason to believe that by the time of Croesus 
 (568 — 554 B.C.) both these metals were used for purposes of 
 coinage in Lydia. 
 
 The Greeks begin to coin money. 
 
 The clever Greeks of Asia Minor, who formed the portal 
 through which so many of the arts of the East reached the 
 Western lands, were not slow to adopt, and by reason of their 
 superior artistic taste to improve, the great Lydian invention. 
 To the Ionic cities such as Phocaea and Miletus we must 
 probably ascribe the credit of substituting artistically engraved 
 dies for the rude Lydian punch-marks, and at a somewhat later 
 period of inscribing them with the name or rather the initial of 
 the people or potentate by whom they were issued. 
 
 The official stamps by which the earliest electrum staters were 
 distinguished from mere ingots consisted at first only of the im- 
 press of rude unengraved punches, between which the lump or 
 oval-shaped bullet of metal was placed to receive the blow of the 
 hammer. Subsequently the art of the engraver was called in to 
 adorn the lower of the two dies, which was always that of the 
 face or obverse of the coin, with the symbol of the local divinity 
 under whose auspices the currency was issued. 
 
 As our object is to deal with coins from the point of view of 
 metrology, the short summary here given of the genesis of the 
 art of coining will suffice for our purposes. 
 
STATEMENT AND CRITICISM OP THE OLD DOCTRINES. 209 
 
 Weight standards. 
 
 " Silver was very rarely at this early period weighed by the 
 same talent and mina as gold, but, according to a standard 
 derived from the gold weight, somewhat as follows : — 
 
 Gold was to silver as 13'3 : 1. This proportion made it 
 difficult to weigh both metals on the same standard. That a 
 round number of silver shekels or staters might equal a gold 
 shekel or stater, the weight of the silver shekel was either 
 raised above or lowered below that of the gold. The heavy gold 
 shekel weighed 260 grains Troy, being the doubleA)f the light 
 gold shekel, which weighed 1,30 grains Troy (8'4 grammes). 
 
 The Silver Standards derived from the Gold Shekel*. 
 
 I. From the heavy gold shekel of 260 grains : 
 
 260 X 13-3 = 3458 grains of silver. 
 3458 grains of silver = 15 shekels of 230 grains each. 
 
 On the silver shekel of 230 grains the Phoenician or Graeco- 
 Asiatic silver standard may be constructed : 
 
 Talent = 690,000 grains = 3000 staters (or shekels). 
 Mina = 11,500 grains = 50 staters. 
 Stater 230 grains. 
 
 II. From the light gold shekel of 130 grains we get the 
 so-called Babylonian or Persian standard : 
 
 130 X 13-3 = 1729 grains of silver. 
 1729 grains of silver = 10 shekels of 172-9 grains each. 
 
 On the silver shekel or stater of 1729 grains the Babylonia, 
 Lydian, and Persian silver standard may be thus constructed: — 
 
 Talent = 518,700 grains = 3000 staters = 6000 sigli. 
 Mina = 8645 grains = 50 „ = 100 „ 
 Stater = 172-9 grains = 1 „ = 2 „ 
 Siglos = 86-45 grains." 
 
 1 Head, op. cit. xxxvi. 
 
 r. 14 
 
210 STATEMENT AND CRITICISM OF THE OLD DOCTRINES. 
 
 It is desirable "to take note of the fact that in Asia Minor and 
 in the earliest periods of the art of coining, (a) the heavy gold 
 stater (260 grains) occurs at various places, from Teos north- 
 wards as far as the shores of the Propontis ; (/8) the light gold 
 stater (130 grains) in Lydia (Kpoto-eto? ararrlp) and in Samos (?); 
 
 (7) the electrum stater of the Phoenician silver standard, chiefly 
 at Miletus, but also at other towns along the west coast of Asia 
 Minor, as well as in Lydia, but never however in full weight ; 
 
 (8) the electrum and silver stater of the Babylonic standard, 
 chiefly if not solely in Lydia ; (e) the silver stater of the Phoe- 
 nician standard (230 grains) on the west coast of Asia Minor^." 
 
 Here we may call attention to the fact that whilst Miletus 
 struck her electrum staters on the Phoenician silver standard 
 (their normal weight being 217 grains), the Phocaeans always 
 from the infancy of coining employed for their electrum the 
 gold standard of the heavy shekel (260 grains). But the proper 
 time for discussing why the Lydians, Milesians and Phocaeans 
 all struck their electrum coins of various standards, will come 
 further on in our enquiry. 
 
 The coin-standards of Greece Proper. 
 
 Before we attempt to examine into the connection of the 
 Homeric talent or ox unit, and the ancient systems of the 
 East, it will be advisable to get a clear view of the coin- 
 standards found in actual use in historical times, and to under- 
 stand the common doctrine of the derivation of the ' same. 
 As gold was not coined in Greece Proper until a comparatively 
 late period, owing doubtless to the fact that there was no 
 great supply of it to be had, and that all of it was required 
 to meet the demand for personal adornment, the entire early 
 coinage of Greece (with some few exceptions to be presently 
 noted) consisted of silver. These silver issues were all struck 
 on either of two systems; (1) the Aeginean, or Aeginetic, 
 and (2) the Euboic, the stater of the former weighing about 
 195 grains, that of the latter about 135 — 130 grains. But it 
 is a fact of paramount importance that gold, whenever and 
 
 ' Head, oy. cit. xxxvi. 
 
STATEMENT AND CRITICISM OF THE OLD DOCTRINES. 211 
 
 wherever coined in Greece, was always on the Euboic standard, 
 and there is likewise every reason to believe that gold bullion 
 in the days before gold was coined was computed according to 
 the same standard. Such at least was undoubtedly the case 
 at Athens, as we learn from Thucydides\ where he describes 
 the resources of Athens both in coined and uncoined metal, and 
 in the gold plates which overlaid the famous chryselephantine 
 statue of Pallas Athene, the masterpiece of Pheidias, and the 
 glory of the Acropolis ; and such also, as we shall see, was the 
 case, in the days of Solon. 
 
 All ancient accounts are agreed in the statement that 
 Aegina was the first place in Hellas Proper which saw the 
 minting of money. That island was famous from old time as 
 the meeting-place of merchants, and as such under its ancient 
 name of Oenone was glorified by Pindar'^. Its position rendered 
 it a most convenient emporium, where the merchantmen of 
 Tyre met in traffic the traders from both Peloponnesus and 
 northern Greece. Tradition makes its population a very mixed 
 one : " It was called Oenone," says Strabo, " in ancient times, 
 and it was settled by Argives, Kretans, Epidaurians, and 
 Dorians'." According to a fragment of Ephorus, to be referred 
 to presently, it was owing to the barren nature of the soil that 
 the natives turned to trade. 
 
 All Greek tradition is unanimous in representing Pheidon 
 of Argos as the first to coin money in Hellas Proper, and to 
 have done so at Aegina. Much obscurity enshrouds the history 
 and the date of Pheidon, owing to the conflicting accounts of 
 the historians. For our immediate purpose it would be quite 
 sufficient to state simply that he cannot have lived later than 
 600 B.C., but in consequence of some prevailing doctrines 
 with regard to the history of Greek weights being based on 
 inferences (probably quite unwarrantable) which have been 
 drawn from the statements given about this despot, we must 
 take a more elaborate survey of the sources. 
 
 1 Thue. II. 13. 
 " 01. I. 75: Nem. iv. 46. 
 
 ^ VIII. 375, oiKOfiofeT-o S' Olvilivri iraXat, eirt^Kfiaav dk aiTTjv 'Afyyeioi Kal KpiJTes 
 /fat 'E7rt5ai)/)iot Kal AwpieiS. 
 
 14—2 
 
212 STATEMENT AND CRITICISM OF THE OLD DOCTRINES. 
 
 Pausanias', writing about 174 A.D. says that the Pisaeans 
 in the eight Olympiad (747 B.C.) brought to their aid Pheidon 
 of Argos, who of all despots in Hellas waxed most insolent, and 
 that along with him they celebrated the festival. But now comes 
 the testimony of Herodotus^ who was writing circ. 440 B.C., 
 and who tells us (vi. 127) that when Cleisthenes the despot of 
 Sicyon held the svayamvara for his daughter Agariste ; 
 amongst the suitors who came from all parts of Hellas, was 
 " Leocedes, son of Pheidon, the despot of the Argives, Pheidon, 
 who had made their measures for the Peloponnesians, and had 
 of all Greeks waxed to the greatest pitch of violence, he who 
 expelled the Elean presidents of the games and himself held 
 the festival." There cannot be the slightest doubt that both 
 Pausanias and Herodotus refer to the same tyrant, but the 
 dates are irreconcileable. As Cleisthenes, the Athenian law- 
 giver, was the son of Agariste, her wooing cannot have been 
 much earlier than 560 B.C., and consequently Pheidon must 
 have reigned at Argos shortly before 600 B.C. 
 
 Weissenborn (followed by Ernst Curtius) has sought to cut 
 the Gordian knot by emending the text of Pausanias, thus 
 reading 28th instead of 8th Olympiad, which would make 
 Pheidon help the Pisaeans in the year 668 B.C. But even this 
 drastic remedy is hardly sufBcient to meet the requirements of 
 the statement of Herodotus. 
 
 Our earliest authority for the tradition that Pheidon coined 
 at Aegina is a passage of Ephorus preserved by Strabo (vill. 
 376)' : " Ephorus says that in Aegina silver was first struck by 
 Pheidon; for it had become an emporium, inasmuch as its 
 population, owing to the barrenness of the land, engaged in 
 maritime trade ; whence trumpery goods are called Aeginean 
 ware." According to another passage of Strabo, which may be 
 likewise from Ephorus, as it comes at the end of a long statement, 
 the first part of which Strabo expressly declares is taken from 
 
 ^ "VI. 22. 2, 'OXu^airiaSt [xkv ttj dydoj] rbv 'Apyeiov inriy ay 01/ ^eiSojva rvpdvvojv twv 
 ii'"E\\T]<Tt jLtaXitrra O^piaavra k.t.\. 
 
 2 ^eidojvo^ 5^ Tou rb, /xerpa woLTjaavTos toTs IXeXoTrovpT^triourt Kal v^piaavTo^ k.t.\. 
 
 3 "Efpopos 5' €v AlyivT] dpyvpov TrpGyrov KOTrTJvai (pricn ijirh ^EiduvoSt ^f^Trbpiov ykp 
 yeveadat, dia t^v XvirpoTT^TO, t^s x^P°-^ '^^^ aydpthiriiiv doKaTTOvpyotjPTOjy iixiropLKuii, 
 a(f ov Thv pwirov Aiyivaiav epLiroKTjv XeyeaOac, 
 
STATEMENT AND CRITICISM OF THE OLD DOCTRINES. 218 
 
 that writer : (" They say) that Pheidon of Argos, who was tenth 
 in descent from Temenus, and who surpassed his contemporaries 
 in his power, whence he recovered the whole of the inherit- 
 ance of Temenus, which had been rent into several parts, and 
 that he invented the measures which are called Pheidonian 
 and weights and stamped currency, both the other kind and 
 that of silver." It must be carefully observed that this is the 
 only ancient passage which says a word about the invention of 
 weights by Pheidon. If this statement can be taken as trust- 
 worthy we might very well conclude that Pheidon was the 
 person who introduced the decimal principle and made 10 silver 
 pieces instead of 15 equivalent to the gold stater. If however 
 this is an addition of Strabo', who wrote about a.d. 1 — 21, and 
 whose account of Greece Proper is the most defective portion 
 of his great work, we cannot let this passage weigh against 
 that already given from Herodotus, who is perfectly silent as 
 regards the invention of weights. Furthermore there is the fact 
 that Strabo does not venture to describe the weights as called 
 Pheidonian, but carefully limits that appellation to the measures 
 as we find also to be the case with Pollux, when he is describing 
 various kinds of vessels : '' and likewise a Pheidon would be a 
 kind of vessel for holding oil, deriving its name from the Phei- 
 donian measures respecting which Aristotle speaks in his Polity 
 of the Argivesl" Here again we find a clear mention of the 
 Pheidonian measures, coupled with the high authority of Ari- 
 stotle's treatise on the Constitution of Argos in his great 
 " Collection of Polities," formed to serve as the material from 
 which to build his great philosophic work on Politics. 
 
 There is again no mention of Pheidonian weights in the 
 newly found Polity of the Athenians (which seems beyond 
 doubt the same as that known to the ancients under the name 
 of Aristotle), where it is stated that " in his (Solon's) time the 
 
 1 Strabo viil. 358, ielSuva Si rbv 'kjyyiiov, SeKarov fih &VTa aivb truikvov, 
 dwafiCL 5i ijirep^e^Xrjixkvov to^s kcit^ aOrov, d^' ^s rrjv re "Kij^tv oXtjv dveXa^e ttjv 
 ^Tj^tvov SLetriratTfjL^i'Tjv ds trXeiu fiepr}, kclI /Merpa i^eupe ra ^CiStipta KaXoTj/ieva Kal 
 orafffiods Kcd v6fit(rp.a Kexo-po.yfJ,€vov to re dXXo Kal rd dpyvpovv. 
 
 ' Pollux Oiiom. X, 179, efi? S' Sv Kal ^eLSuv ri 0776101' iXairipov, airb tuv $ei- 
 dwviiov ixkrpiiiv (j3vop.aiTp^vov, iiwip iav h ^Apyeiwv TroKtreiq. 'ApttrroreXj/s Xkyei. 
 
214 STATEMENT AND CRITICISM OF THE OLD DOCTRINES. 
 
 measures (at Athens) were made larger than those of Pheidoii 
 (c. lOy. Although the writer refers to the Aeginetic coin- 
 weights in the next clause, he does not refer to them as the 
 Pheidonian. 
 
 Now let us pass on to a remarkable passa'ge'nrttfe Ety'rfio-' 
 logicum Magnum (s. v. 'OySeXt'cr/co?). 
 
 "First of all men Pheidon of Argos struck money in Aegina ; 
 and having given them (his subjects) coin and abolished the 
 spits, he dedicated them to Hera in Argos. But since at that 
 time the spits used to fill the hand, that is the grasp, we, 
 although we do not fill our hand with the six obols (spits) call it 
 a grasp full (BpaxM) owing to the grasping of them, Whence 
 even still to this day we call the usurer the STpit-weigher, since 
 by weights the men of old used to hand (money) over^" The 
 writer of this passage evidently regards Pheidon as the first 
 inventor of the art of coining but not of weight standards. 
 
 Finally the Parian Marble recounts that, "Pheidon the 
 Argive confiscated the measures... and remade them and made 
 silver coin in Aegina ^" Such then is the body of evidence 
 which we possess, all pointing to Aegina as the first place in 
 Greece which saw a mint set up, and to Pheidon of Argos as 
 the first to establish that mint. As we have pointed out above 
 we have nothing but a very dubious statement of Strabo (which 
 is coupled with another most certainly wrong, i.e., that Pheidon 
 was the inventor of every other kind of money as well as silver) 
 as regards the iavention of weights by Pheidon, although from 
 the passage in Herodotus already quoted, metrologists one 
 after another have assumed that the measures (fierpa) meant a 
 metric system in the modern sense, and have not hesitated to 
 
 1 This enables us to understand why it was that in the truce at Pylus it was 
 stipulated (probably by the Spartans) that they should be allowed to send in 2 
 Attic (not Peleponuesian) ohoenikes of barley meal for each of their men daily. 
 By this arrangement the beleaguered men got a larger ration. 
 
 ^ iravToiv di irpCiTos ieidui' 'Apyeios yofUff/ia iKoxl/ev iv Alyliry Kai Soils t6 
 p6/j.L(TiJ.a Kal dpaXa^iiv roiis djleXljKovs, aved-qKe rg iv "Apyei "H/){t, iireiSii Si t6t€ ol 
 d^eXljKoi T^v X"?" iv'K-qpovv, Tovrecn, r-qv SpaKa, Tji^els, KaLirep ^^ TrXtipoOvres 
 TT]v SpaKa To'is ?^ d^oXovs dpaxp-TJ" airriv \4yopi,ey irapi, t6 5pa,^a.7d<u. 
 
 '' ^eldav 6 'Apycios ^Siiweiicre to ii.hpa...Kai aveiTKeiture Kal m/ua-pia apyupoSv iv 
 Alylvjj iiroiTjaef (1. 30). 
 
STATEMENT AND CRITICISM OF THE OLD DOCTHINES. 2lS 
 
 build on this somewhat crazy t'ouudation an elaborate Aeginetic 
 system of weights and measures intimately related to each other. 
 We are then probably justified in assuming that Pheidon 
 coined silver at Aegina. The numismatic evidence coincides 
 with the literary authorities. The coins of Aegina are well 
 known, for from first to last the symbol of the sea tortoise 
 (%6Xc<)i'i;, from which they are called in vulgar parlance tortoises) 
 is found on them. Why Pheidon set up his mint in Aegina 
 instead of in his own city of Argos is not very difficult to under- 
 stand. Argos was an inland town remote from the highways of 
 commerce, and little in contact with the merchants of the 
 Levant. On the other hand Aegina stood at the portal of 
 central Greece, intercepting the trade of Athens and Corinth; 
 in later days Pericles called it the "eyesore of the Piraeus." It 
 would be probably here that the Greeks first saw the new 
 invention of the East in the hands of the foreign traders, and 
 it would be here, in a great emporium, that the need of a 
 currency would be most felt. In an inland city like Argos or 
 Sparta bars of bronze or iron would serve well for the small 
 commercial transactions of a very primitive society, as we know 
 that the iron currency actually did at Sparta in historical times. 
 E. Curtius suggested {Ntimism. Ghron., 1870) that the tortoise 
 on the Aeginetan coins, which is the symbol of Ashtaroth who 
 was the Phoenician goddess both of the sea and of trade, may 
 be an indication that the mint was set up in the temple of 
 Aphrodite, which overlooked the great harbour of Aegina. 
 Whilst his hypothesis as regards the origin of the tortoise type 
 on the coin is probably wrong, it is quite possible that the coins 
 were first struck in some temple, as we know that the great 
 shrines of the ancient world served as banks and treasuries, 
 as for example the temple of Athena at Athens, that of Apollo 
 at Delphi, and that of Juno Moneta at Rome. The temple 
 priests of Delphi and other rich shrines had at their command 
 large stores of the precious metals, which in the earliest times 
 doubtless were in the shape of small ingots or bullets, such 
 as the gold talents mentioned in the Homeric Poems. 
 
 The temple shrines of Delphi and 01ympia,Delos and Dodona 
 were centres not merely of religious cult, but likewise of trade 
 
216 STATEMENT AND ClUTICISM OF THE OLD DOCTRINES. 
 
 and commerce, just as the great fairs of the Middle Ages grew 
 primarily out of the feast day of the local saint, merchants and 
 traders taking advantage of the assembling together of large 
 bodies of worshippers from various quarters to ply their calling 
 and to tempt them with their wares. The temple authorities 
 encouraged trade in every way; they constructed sacred roads, 
 which gave facility for travelling at a time when roads as a 
 general rule were almost unknown, and what was just as im- 
 portant, they placed these roads and consequently the persons 
 who travelled on them under the protection of the god 
 to whose temple they led in each case, thus affording a safe 
 conduct to the trader as well as the pilgrim ; again at the 
 time of the sacred festivals all strife had to cease, the voice of 
 war was hushed, and thus even amidst the noise of intestine 
 struggles and international strife, peace offered a breathing 
 space for trade and commerce. Hence the probability is con- 
 siderable that the art of minting money, that is, of stamping 
 with a symbol the ingots or talents of gold or silver which had 
 circulated in this simple form for centuries, first had its birth 
 in the sanctuary of some god. 
 
 On the whole then we may assume that the bullet-shaped 
 coins of Aegina, which are undoubtedly the earliest coins of 
 Greece Proper, are the Pheidonian currency mentioned in the 
 ancient authors and on the Parian Marble. As silver was 
 probably not at all plenty at Argos, but was brought to Aegina 
 by the traders, Pheidon had every motive for minting at 
 Aegina instead of at his own capital. The fact that the Romans 
 struck silver coins in Campania before they issued any at 
 Rome affords a curious parallel. A local supply of the metal 
 offers the explanation in each case. "It may be also positively 
 asserted that none of the Aeginetan coins are older than the 
 earliest Lydian electrum money, and that consequently the 
 date of the introduction of coined money into Peloponnesus 
 must be subsequent to circ. 700 B.C. It follows that Pheidon 
 was not the inventor of money, for already before bis time all 
 the coasts and islands of the Aegean must have been acquainted 
 with the pale yellow electrum coins of Lydia and Ionian" 
 ^ Head o/j. cit. xxxviii. 
 
STATEMENT AND CRITICISM OF THE OLD DOCTRINES. 217 
 
 What then was the standard on which these early coins of 
 Aegina were struck ? 
 
 The heaviest specimens of these Aeginetan staters or di- 
 drachms weigh over 200 grains Troy, but these seem somewhat 
 exceptional. The best numismatic authorities are agreed in 
 setting the normal weight at 196 grains Troy ; the drachm 
 consequently weighs 98 grains, and the obol about 16 grains. 
 The origin of this standard has caused much difficulty to 
 metrologists. For it is not the standard of the Babylonian gold 
 shekel of 130 grains, nor of the Babylonian silver shekel of 172 
 grains, nor again that of the Phoenician silver shekel of 230 
 grains. Various solutions have been proposed. Brandis^ re- 
 gards it as a raised Babylonian silver standard, 172'9 to 196 
 grains. Mr Head regards it as the reduced Phoenician 
 standard; "The weight standard which the Peloponnesians had 
 received in old times from the Phoenician traders had suffered 
 in the course of about two centuries a very considerable 
 degradation ^" Others, like Mr Flinders Petrie (Encyclop. 
 Britannica, Weights and Measures), regard it as Egyptian in 
 origin. According to Herodotus (ll. 178) the Aeginetans were 
 on terms of friendly intercourse with Egypt ; furthermore 
 weights of this standard have been found in Egypt. 
 
 Again, Dr Hultsch (MetrolJ' p. 188) regards it as an in- 
 dependent standard midway between the Babylonian silver 
 standard (172'9 grs.) on the one hand, and the Phoenician 
 silver standard (230 grs.) on the other, the old Aeginetan 
 silver mina being equivalent in value to six light Babylonian 
 shekels of gold (130x6 = 780 grs. = 10300 grs. of silver), assuming 
 that in Greece as in Asia Minor gold was to silver as 13"3 : 1. 
 
 All these theories labour under serious difficulties. Brandis' 
 theory was overthrown easily as soon as attention was called 
 to the well-defined heavy series of Aeginetic coins, be having 
 been led to his opinion by a comparison of the heaviest 
 specimen of the Babylonian standard with the lightest of the 
 Aeginetic. Here incidentally we may call the readers' attention 
 to the fact that in numismatics the weight of the heaviest 
 specimens of any series must be regarded as the true index of 
 
 1 Op. clt. 153. ' Op. cit. XXXVIII. 
 
218 STATEMENT AND CR£TICISM OF THE OLD DOCTRINES. 
 
 the normal weight, for whatever may have been the inclination 
 bo mint coins of a weight lighter than the proper standard, we 
 may rest assured that the ancient mint-master was no more 
 inclined than his modern representative to put into coins of 
 gold or silver a single grain more than the legal amount. 
 Hence it is a most faulty and fallacious method when dealing 
 with coin weights to take the average of a certain number of 
 specimens as the true standard. Out of 30 specimens 29 may 
 have lost more or less in weight by wear, whilst one may be a 
 fleur de coin, perfect as at the moment when it left the die. 
 No one can doubt that the evidence of that single coin as 
 regards the standard is worth far more than that of all the 
 remaining 29 examples. I have thought it well to call attention 
 to this question of method as the vicious principle of arriving 
 at standards by taking the average is still found in works of 
 men of great eminence. 
 
 Next let us consider the probability of the derivation of the 
 Aeginetic standard from Egypt. The fact that weights of like 
 standard have been found in that country, although superficially 
 plausible, in reality is of little force as evidence of borrowing. 
 For unless we find that the Egyptians used those weights for 
 weighing silver, even the prima facie case breaks down at once. 
 As a matter of fact there is no evidence up to the present 
 that these weights were so employed, although there is some 
 evidence of their being employed for gold (Flinders Petrie, 
 op. cit). But even granting that the Egyptians used the 
 same standard as the Aeginetans for silver, it does not at all 
 follow that there has been borrowing on either side. On the 
 principle laid down below it will be seen that it is quite possible 
 for two peoples to evolve a like silver standard perfectly in- 
 dependently of each other. But the real difficulty which besets 
 the theory of an Egyptian origin is that if the Aeginetans were 
 to borrow their standard from abroad, the people from whom 
 they would in all probability have obtained it were not the 
 Egyptians, with whom they had but slight relations directly, 
 but rather the Phoenicians, with whom they were in constant 
 intercourse. 
 
 It cannot be proved that at any time the Egyptians were a 
 
STATEMENT AND CKITICISM OF THE OLD DOCTRINES. 219 
 
 maritime people trading round the coasts of Greece. There 
 was undoubtedly intercourse between Greece and Egypt, but 
 that intercourse was through the medium of the shipmen of 
 Tyre. Why should then the Aeginetans adopt a standard from 
 abroad which differed from that of the Phoenicians with whom 
 they were in constant commercial relations ? Again, if there is 
 any connection between the importation of weight standards 
 and the commencement of coinage, it may be urged that whilst 
 it was from the Phoenicians the Aeginetans learned the art 
 which had been originated in Asia Minor, or at all events from 
 the Greeks of the coast of Asia Minor who coined electrum 
 money on the Phoenician standard, we ought naturally to find 
 the Greeks of Aegina using this standard for their earliest 
 coinage rather than a standard borrowed from Egypt, which 
 most certainly was very backward in developing the art of 
 coining, seeing that it was not until after the conquest of that 
 country by Alexander the Great (b.c. 330) that money was 
 there struck for the first time'. 
 
 Passing by for the moment Mr Head's view, let us next 
 deal with that of Dr Hultsch. This theory has the great merit 
 of granting that the Greeks were capable of evolving a silver 
 standard for themselves from a knowledge of the relative value 
 of gold and silver, whilst the other theories assume that they 
 borrowed blindly ready-made standards, which they for some 
 unknown reason either raised according to Brandis, or degraded 
 according to Head. But Dr Hultsch is met by two crucial 
 difficulties. (1) Why should the Aeginetans have taken six light 
 Babylonian shekels of gold and arbitrarily made them the basis 
 of their new silver standard ? (2) But the fatal objection is 
 that whereas Hultsch's theory depends on gold being to silver 
 in the same relation (13'3 : 1) in Greece Proper as it was in 
 Asia Minor, as a matter of fact it can be proved that the precious 
 metals there stood in a very different relation to each other. 
 In the Journal of Hellenic Studies, 1887, I gave some reasons 
 for believing that in early times gold was to silver in Greece in 
 the relation of 15 : 1. For whilst gold was plentiful in Asia, 
 
 1 Of course it is quite possible that the Persiaas issued coins in Egypt after 
 their conquest, but these coins cannot be regarded as really Egyptian. 
 
220 STATEMENT AND CRITICISM OF THE OLD DOCTRINES. 
 
 at no place in Greece Proper were there auriferous deposits. 
 Hence it is probable that gold had to silver a higher relative 
 value in Greece than it had in Asia. Certain archaeo- 
 logical discoveries recently made at Athens add great strength 
 to the view which I then put forward. At a meeting of the 
 Berlin Academy of Science in 1889 Dr Ulrich Kohler discussed 
 certain fragments of inscriptions which refer to the famous 
 statue of Athena, wrought in gold and ivory by Pheidias for 
 the Parthenon. By combining with a fragment published by 
 M. Foucart (Bullet, de Corresp. Hell. 1889, p. 171), another 
 fragment previously copied by himself, Dr Kohler arrived at 
 the result that the fragments relate to the purchase of materials 
 for the construction of the statue, that is of gold and ivory. 
 The gold purchased is described both according to its weight 
 and according to the price (Tifj-rj) paid for it in Attic silver 
 currency (whilst the ivory is only described by the value or 
 price). The sum paid for gold amounted to 526'6.52 drachms, 
 5 obols, the weight of the gold being 37'618 drachms : from 
 this we learn that the relative value of gold to silver at that 
 time was as 14 : 1. According to Thucydides (ll. 13), forty 
 talents of gold were used in the making of the statue, whilst 
 according to the more explicit statement of Philochorus the 
 amount was forty-four. The image was dedicated at the great 
 Panathenaic festival of the year 438 B.C. As not more than 
 10 to 11 talents of gold were used in the three years to 
 which the fragments refer, Kohler draws the inference that 
 the construction of the statue commenced in the same year 
 as that of the Parthenon (447 B.C.), and that Pheidias was 
 engaged on his great work for fully nine years. 
 
 We thus know now the relative value of silver and gold in 
 Attica about 4.50 B.C. But we must not regard this as the 
 relation which existed at earlier times. It was only after the 
 Persian wars that Athens had got possession of the island of 
 Thasos with its rich gold mines, and the equally rich districts 
 on the Thracian coast. The fact of her coming into the pos- 
 session of such wealthy gold-producing regions must have 
 materially lowered the price of gold in Athens. We know how 
 the development of the mines of Pangaeum by Philip of Macedon 
 
STATEMENT AND CRITICISM OF THE OLD DOCTRINES. 221 
 
 in the following century lowered the value of gold throughout 
 Greece, for by the time of Alexander the relative value of the 
 two precious metals was as 10 : 1. In the sixth century B.C. 
 gold was so scarce in Greece that when the Spartans wanted to 
 make a dedication in gold they had to send to Asia to obtain a 
 sufficient supply of the metal \ Hence if we conclude that 
 in earlier times the relative value of gold to silver in Greece 
 proper was as 15 : 1, we shall not be far from the truth. At 
 all events it is put beyond doubt that the relation was higher 
 than that of 13'3 : 1, and accordingly Dr Hultsch's theory of the 
 origin of the Aeginetic silver standard, which is based on that 
 relation falls at once to the ground, unless he can shew that 
 such a standard, based on six light gold Babylonian shekels 
 had been previously fixed in Asia or Egypt, and thence adopted 
 by the Greeks without any regard to the relative value existing 
 in Greece itself between the precious metals. But as a matter 
 of fact Dr Hultsch does not make any such attempt. Thus 
 this essay at a solution breaks down. 
 
 On the other hand if we make the very slight and very 
 probable assumption that the early Greeks had formed a 
 definite idea of the relative value of gold and silver, which they 
 would have determined exactly on the same principle as they 
 would arrive at a notion of the relative value of any other two 
 commodities, which they were in the habit of giving and taking 
 in exchange, that is by the simple principle of supply and 
 demand, we shall find a ready solution without having to 
 resort to either Egypt or Babylon. If gold was to silver as 
 15 : 1 in Greece, it follows that the Homeric talent, the earliest 
 Greek standard, being about 135 grains, ten silver pieces of 
 202 grains each would be equivalent to one gold unit 
 
 135 X 15 = 2025 grs. of silver. 
 = 202'5 grs. of silver. 
 
 This gives a singularly close approximation to the weight of 
 the existing coins of the Aeginetic standard of the earliest and 
 heaviest kind. Taking the Homeric talent at 130 grains of 
 
 1 Herod, i. 62, 
 
222 STATEMENT AND CKITICISM OF THE OLD DOCTRINES. 
 
 gold, by the same process we obtain 10 silver pieces each of 
 the weight of 195 grains (130x15 = 1950; 1950 -=- 10 = 195 
 grs. 
 
 The second standard which we find in Greece at the bc^- 
 ginning of the historical epoch was the Euboic. This standard 
 was used for both silver and gold. The ordinary account 
 of its origin is as follows : " From Ionia possibly through 
 Samos the Euboeans imported the standard by which tlioy 
 weighed their silver. This standard was the light Assyrio- 
 Babylonian gold mina with its shekel oi' stater of about 130 
 grains. The Euboeans having little or no gold transfeiTud the 
 weight used in Asia for gold to their own silver, raising it 
 slightly at the same time to a maximum of 135 grains, and 
 from Euboea it soon spread over a large part of the Greek world 
 by means of the widely extended commercial relations of the 
 enterprising Euboean cities. This may have taken place 
 towards the close of the eighth century and before the war 
 which broke out at the end of that century between Chalcis 
 and Eretria, nominally for the possession of the fields of Le- 
 lantum, which lay between the two rival cities'. 
 
 This Euboic standard of 135 — 130 grains is seen at once 
 to be identical in weight with the Homeric talent. 
 
 Several difficulties (irrespective of the fact that there was no 
 need for the Greeks to borrow from Asia a standard which they 
 themselves already possessed from very early times) meet this 
 theory. 
 
 (1) If the Euboeans derived their standard from Ionia 
 why did they not rather adopt the Phoenician standards, on 
 which we have already seen the great Ionian cities based their 
 coinages of gold, silver, and electrum ? Some very early 
 electrum coins found at Samos (Head, op. cit. XLI.), have 
 suggested that that islarif] formed the link. "The theory," 
 says Mr Head, " that Samos was the port wheiioc the Euboeans 
 derived the gold standard subseijuently u.sed by them for silver, 
 
 ' Head, op. cit. p. xl. Professor Percy Gardner (Types of Greek Coinn, 
 ■p. 2), regards the Euboic standard as 130, which he thinks was raised to 
 13.5 grs. by Solon when the latter introduced (as he supposes) the Euboic system 
 at Athens. 
 
STATEMENT AND CRITICISM OF THE OLD DOCTRINES. 223 
 
 rests upon the weight of some very early electrum coins (about 
 44 grs.) which have been found in the island of Samos, and 
 of the earliest Euboean coins, Euboea and Samos having been 
 two of the greatest colonizing and maritime powers of the 
 Aegean Sea. Thus I think we may account for the fact that 
 the towns of Euboea, when they began to strike silver money of 
 their own, naturally made use of the standard which had become 
 from of old habitual in the island, precisely in the same way as 
 Pheidon in Peloponnesus struck his first silver money on the 
 reduced Phoenician standard which was prevalent at the time in 
 his dominions." But as a matter of fact the recognized Samian 
 coins are of the Phoenician standard (220 grs.) in its slightly 
 reduced state as found at Miletus (Head, op. cit. 515). This 
 being so it would indeed be strange if the Euboeans from oc- 
 casionally coming in contact with Lydian coins at Samos would 
 have adopted that standard in preference to that in use in the 
 great cities of Ionia with which their commerce directly lay. 
 
 (2) Why did the Euboeans take the Lydian gold standard 
 of 130 grs. for their own electrum and silver instead of the 
 Lydian silver standard of 172'9 grs. ? According to Mr Head's 
 view, as we have seen above, the early Lydian electrum was 
 struck on the standard of 172 grs. (the so-called Babylonian 
 silver) when meant for circulation in the interior of Asia Minor, 
 but on the Phoenician standard for circulation in trade with 
 the Greeks of the coast of Ionia. 
 
 (3) We may ask the question, why did the Euboeans if 
 they were taking over a ready-made standard which had no 
 relation to any standard which they themselves already pos- 
 sessed, adopt the gold standard of 130 grs. instead of the 
 electrum and silver standard which was in use among all the 
 Greek cities with which they traded ? 
 
 We can now conveniently revert to the theory that the 
 Aeginetan silver standard was a reduced Phoenician. Much has 
 been written about degradation of coin weights and reduced 
 standards. It may be therefore well to clear our notions on 
 the subject by asking ourselves what do we mean by such 
 terms. Both the terms and the process are equally familiar 
 to those at all acquainted with the history of mediaeval coinage. 
 
224 STATEMENT AND CEITICISM OF THE OLD DOCTRINES. 
 
 The king then controlled, as for instance in England, the 
 mintage. If the sovereign thought fit to reduce the amount of 
 silver in the groat from 80 to 72 grains his subjects had no 
 alternative but to take the new and lighter pieces as equivalent 
 to four pennies sterling. The sovereign thus was able to re- 
 lieve an exhausted treasury, making a considerable profit off 
 every groat and penny put into circulation. Again, the im- 
 pecunious monarch might resort to another method of making 
 a profit, by debasing the coinage, and might issue one such as 
 the fourth of Henry VIII., of exceeding base silver, and again 
 his subjects could simply grumble and take the new money. 
 These groats and pennies passed as such within the realm, but 
 when the question of foreign exchange came, the matter assumed 
 an entirely new complexion. Would a shrewd Flemish merchant 
 from Antwerp accept a base or a reduced English groat at the 
 same rate for which it passed current in England? Of course he 
 did no such thing, and the scales were at once called into use, 
 and the silver changed hands not by tale, but by weight. Now 
 the condition under which such a degradation or debasing of 
 the coinage as we have described can take place is that a state 
 or country shall be of such considerable magnitude that it has 
 room within its own borders to employ a large amount of coin 
 in internal trade without much necessity of external commerce. 
 Did such conditions exist among the Greek states of antiquity? 
 There is another condition, namely, sovereign power vested in 
 the hands of a monarch possessed of unlimited authority, who 
 has a direct personal interest in the profit to be made from the 
 degradation of the coinage, and who has power sufficient to 
 enable him to force his debased coinage on a reluctant people. 
 Did such conditions exist in any of the Greek states of an- 
 tiquity? Nowhere in Greece Proper do we find them fulfilled, 
 but if we turn to Sicily we get a good example of the practice 
 so often followed in after centuries by the mediaeval monarchs. 
 The tyrant Dionysius there put an arbitrary value on gold in 
 relation to silver: for although this relation was probably not 
 more than 12 : 1, this despot raised it perforce to 15 : 1^ He 
 
 ' Head, Coinage of Syraotise, p. 71, 
 
STATEMENT AND CRITICISM OF THE OLD DOCTRINES. 225 
 
 also issued a coinage of tin, according to Aristotle^ which he 
 perhaps forced his subjects to take as equivalent to silver coins 
 of like size. In later years again when Timoleon liberated 
 Syracuse and the democracy was once more restored, the 
 state issued a coinage of electrum instead of that of pure 
 gold, which had previously been in currency, by this means 
 making a profit of 20 per cent." It is hardly necessary to 
 point out that whilst this coinage of Dionysius might pass 
 for an artificial value within the dominions of Syracuse, the 
 moment a Syracusan came to make payment to a foreign 
 merchant, its factitious value vanished and the transaction took 
 place according to the current value of the metals. So as long 
 as the English penny remained of good weight and quality it 
 found ready currency on the continent, and the potentates of 
 Flanders issued numerous imitations of them known as ester- 
 lings, but when the English silver penny became debased all 
 foreign imitations ceased^ Now the Greek states of Greece 
 Proper were very small in extent, and seldom had a very 
 strong central authority. The area being limited it was abso- 
 lutely necessary for them to have constant dealings with their 
 neighbours. It would have been difficult for any government 
 in republican times to have forced on its citizens a debased 
 silver currency, and even had this been possible, any benefit 
 derived therefrom would have been counterbalanced by the 
 great drawback arising to trade. If Athens had reduced her 
 famous "Owls" or as they were otherwise called "Maidens" 
 (from the head of Pallas Athena), by five grains, her credit would 
 have suffered and her merchants have gained nothing by it, as 
 the balance would have been at once resorted to, and allowance 
 would have had to be made on each coin of the new debased 
 standard. We who live in modern times are too apt to forget 
 the readiness with which men in older days had resort to the 
 scales, although at this moment large transactions in gold 
 between bankers and financiers are carried out by weight. 
 Only so late as the beginning of this century, when the gold 
 coinage of the country was in a wretched state, every farmer and 
 
 ' Arist. Oecononiica, ii. 21. ' Head, op. cit. p. 26. 
 
 " Chautard, Imitatinns dps mormmes au type esterling (Nancy, 1S71). 
 
 R. 1.5 
 
226 STATEMENT AND CRITICISM OF THE OLD DOCTRINES. 
 
 trader went to fairs in Ireland equipped with a pocket balance 
 (which was adjusted for the guinea, half-guinea, sovereign, half- 
 sovereign, and gold seven-shilling-piece). 
 
 It is difficult then to see what it would have availed the 
 Aeginetans to have reduced the standard which they are sup- 
 posed to have got from the Phoenicians. 
 
 Their island state was of diminutive proportions; they 
 devoted themselves almost entirely to traffick by sea, their 
 island was an emporium where strangers resorted. In all 
 dealings with the Phoenicians they would have to pay a draw- 
 back on their debased coin; for the cunning Phoenician or 
 Ionian was not hkely to be beguiled into taking staters of 
 200 grs. as equivalent to 230 grs. It is plain therefore that 
 when we find divergencies of standard these are not due to 
 mere degradation, but to some far more practical consideration, 
 and this will be seen all the more clearly when we shall 
 find that whilst we have divergencies in silver standards, the 
 gold standard which was in use in Greece from Homeric times 
 down to the Roman Conquest remains almost absolutely with- 
 out variation. But there are other and stronger objections 
 against the Phoenician origin of the Aeginetic standard. 
 
 Now if we accept the doctrine that the Greeks received 
 their coin-standards across the sea from Asia, the Aeginetic 
 from the Phoenician traders whose commerce lay with Aegina 
 and Peloponnesus, the Euhoic on the other hand from Lydia 
 by way of the great Ionian cities on the coast of Asia Minor, 
 we become involved in a serious difficulty. At the time re- 
 presented in the Homeric Poems, there is not as yet a single 
 Greek colony on the coast of Asia Minora Miletus, destined to 
 be in after years the Queen of Ionia, and to be one of the 
 greatest centres of Hellenic commerce and culture, is as yet 
 known only as the city of the barbarous-speaking Carians^ 
 Yet we find the Greeks represented in these self-same poems 
 as already in possession of a standard for gold identical with 
 the light Babylonian or Lydian gold shekel (130 grs.). But 
 again we find from the same source that the Greeks were 
 
 1 Mr D. B. Monro, Historical Review, January, 1886. 
 
 2 II. n. 867. 
 
STATEMENT AND CRITICISM OF THE OLD DOCTRINES. 227 
 
 already in full commercial intercourse with one Asiatic people, 
 but not a people who could serve as a bridge between Lydia 
 and Euboea, Everywhere in the Homeric Poems we meet the 
 shipmen of Tyre, who are represented as bringing the products 
 of the skilled artists of Sidon, beautiful cloths, and cunuinsflv 
 wrought vessels of silver, articles of jewellery, necklaces^ set 
 mth amber (perhaps brought from the coasts of the Baltic), 
 and now and then as chance arose, kidnapping women and 
 childi'en to sell as slaves in the marts of the Mediterranean^ 
 
 If the Hellenes had got their standard from an Asiatic 
 source, it must have been the heavy gold shekel of 260 grains, 
 which the Phoenicians employed, and consequently the Homeric 
 Talent would have weighed 260 instead of 130 grains, or on the 
 other hand if it be supposed that the Greeks might borrow and 
 use for their own gold a standard used only for silver in Asia, 
 the Homeric Talent ought to have weighed 225 grains, that is 
 the Phoenician silver standard, which, as we have seen, it 
 certainly did not 
 
 A further difficulty arises in reference to the Euhoic stand- 
 ard. No one who reflects for a moment could venture to 
 assert that Phoenician trade and influence were limited to 
 Southern Greece. Yet that virtually is the tacit assumption 
 made by those who derive the standard from Asia. There is 
 evidence to shew that the Phoenicians from a very early period 
 frequented Euboea, doubtless attracted by its copper mines 
 (from which perhaps the femous city of Chalcis derived its 
 name)'. Roimd no spot in Hellas do more legends cluster 
 which connect it with Phoenician colonists than Boeotia. It 
 was here that Cadmus settled, and introduced the Phoe- 
 nician alphabet, it was here according to Greek tradition that 
 Herakles, who is so strongly identified with the Phoenician 
 Melkarth, had his birth. Why then should the Euboeans have 
 been behind the rest of Hellas in receiving the Phoenician 
 standard, which, according to Mr Head, as we saw above, did 
 
 1 Od. XV. 460. a Od. sr. 470. 
 
 ' It is more probable however ihat ChaVtos copper got its name from the 
 place (Chalcis) where it was first fonnd in Greece. The name Chalcis may 
 itself be connected with x«^(^ ^^ oi^'- 
 
 15—2 
 
228 STATEMENT AND CRITICISM OF THE OLD DOCTRINES. 
 
 influence so powerfully the Ionic cities of the Asiatic seaboard, 
 with which their commerce was so largely connected ? 
 
 From these considerations it follows that before the Greeks 
 came into contact with either Phoenicians or Lydians they had 
 a weight standard of their own, the Talanton of the Homeric 
 Poems, based on the cow, which was as yet only employed for 
 the weighing of gold. 
 
 This standard we have found to be identical with one of the 
 two chief standards employed in historical times for silver, and 
 which from first to last was the only standard employed for gold 
 in all parts of Hellas Proper. 
 
 As we have seen that gold was to silver in that region as 
 1.5 : 1, there was not much difficulty in regarding fifteen weights 
 or .staters of silver as equivalent to one of gold of like weight. 
 Hence there was not the same need in Greece to devise a 
 separate silver standard as there was in Asia, where the 
 relation of the precious metals stood as 13'3 : 1, a fact which 
 made simple exchange very difficult. On the other hand we 
 have seen that for the Aeginetans and Greeks, who used the so- 
 called Aeginetic standard, the decimal system, the simplest and 
 most primitive method of reckoning, had a powerful attraction. 
 
 Primitive peoples perform all their calculations by means of 
 counters, using for such purposes their fingers and toes or seeds 
 or pebbles. 
 
 Nature herself has supplied man with the simplest and most 
 convenient of counters in his ten fingers. Hence naturally 
 arises a preference amongst primitive peoples for counting by 
 tens, and this method, although it has at times been sup- 
 planted partially (seldom altogether) by the duodecimal and 
 sexagesimal systems, which are superior by possessing a greater 
 number of submultiples than the decimal (e.g. 12 = 6 x 2, 4 x 3, 
 whilst 10 = 5 X 2 only), was adhered to by the Egyptians all 
 through their history down to the latest Pharaohs. It may 
 then perhaps be argued that it was through Egyptian influence 
 with Greece that a large part of Greece adopted for their silver 
 a standard based on the decimal system, especially as certain 
 traces of Egyptian influence in very early times have been 
 discovered of late. But as I have already pointed out above 
 
STATEMENT AND CRITICISM OF THE OLD DOCTRINES. 22D 
 
 when discussing the theory of an Egyptian origin for the 
 Aeginetan standard, because standards of like weight ai-e found 
 in two different regions, it by no means follows that one has 
 borrowed from the other. If we can point out that in both 
 Egypt and Greece there was a standard for gold almost identical 
 in weight, it is at once apparent that there was no need for the 
 Greeks to borrow from the Egyptians the idea of making ten 
 silver ingots or wedges equal to one gold; especially as the 
 decimal idea was next to that of five the simplest and most 
 rudimentary form of calculation known to mankind. It is 
 certainly preposterous to suppose that the Greeks were too 
 bai'barous at the time when they had attained a knowledge of 
 silver to devise such a simple process as that of taking the 
 fifteen ingots of silver, which from the natural laws of supply 
 and demand they regarded as the etpivalent of oae gold ingot of 
 like weight, and redividing them into ten new ingots of silver. 
 This surely will not seem an incredible feat for the early 
 Hellenes to perform when we recall to mind the extraoi'dinary 
 skill in arithmetic which is found among some barbarous peoples. 
 " In West Africa a lively and continual habit of bai-gaining has 
 developed a great power of ai-ithmetic, and little children 
 already do feats of computation with their heaps of cowries^" 
 To imagine that the Greeks could not perform so simple a feat 
 as that which I propose is to assume that they were in a far 
 lower condition of cultm-e and intelligence than the negroes of 
 West Africa, rather resembling the lowest known tribes of men, 
 such as the aborigines of Australia and the savages of the South 
 American forests. To make such an assumption respecting a 
 race which has shewn such an unrivalled potentiahty of progi-ess 
 and development as the Greeks is absurd. 
 
 At this point it will be convenient to take a general survey 
 of our results so far. We found in the Homeric Poems a two- 
 fold system of cun-ency, the gold Talanton, and the cow or ox, 
 the latter alone being employed to express values : we next 
 foimd that the Talanton was the equivalent of the cow, the 
 metallic unit being clearly the later in origin, and being based 
 
 1 Tylor, Primitive Culture, Vol. i. p. 219. 
 
230 STATEMENT AND CRITICISM OF THE OLD DOCTRINES. 
 
 on or equated to the older unit of barter. Through the sacer- 
 dotal tradition of Delos we were enabled to fix the value of the 
 Homeric Talanton at 2 gold Attic drachms, or a Daric (135 
 — 130 grains Troy). Next came the standards used in historical 
 Greece. (1) The Euboic (135 grains Troy) used for silver in the 
 great Euboic towns, in Corinth, in Athens from the time of 
 Solon, and as a matter of course in the Chalcidian and Corinthian 
 colonies, and employed as the sole unit for gold in all parts of 
 Greece Proper at all periods; (2) the Aeginetic (200—195 grains) 
 employed in Peloponnesus, in Boeotia and Central Greece. We 
 learned that the Euboic standard coincided with the Homeric 
 Talanton, thus finding the Greeks of historical times using the 
 same standard universally for gold which they had employed 
 long before the introduction of the art of coining from Asia, 
 and partly using this same standard for silver, whilst in other 
 states they employed a standard for the latter metal, which was 
 based on the gold unit, simply dividing the amount of silver 
 equivalent to it into ten parts instead of fifteen. 
 
 We then put the question, " Is it rational to suppose that 
 the Greeks borrowed in the 7th century B.C. along with the art 
 of coining from Asia a standard which they themselves already 
 long since possessed ?" 
 
 At the time when I first put this view forward, I was unable 
 to offer any concrete proof of the existence of such a standard 
 on Greek soil before the introduction of coined money, although 
 the literary evidence was of the strongest kind. Since then 
 I have been enabled to obtain some data of considerable im- 
 portance. I have already (Chap, ii.) described the rings and 
 spirals of gold and silver found at Mycenae, and shewn that 
 they were not improbably made on a standard of 135 grs. 
 We have thus found some definite evidence of the existence 
 of a gold and possibly a silver standard, corresponding to the 
 standard used for both metals in after ages under the name 
 of the Euboic or Attic. It may of course be argued that 
 though found on Greek soil, they are not really Greek in origin. 
 'S'ox instance there may be certain indications of Egyptian art 
 and influence in these pre-historic remains, such as the frieze 
 discovered in the Palace at Tiryns of alabaster inlaid with 
 
STATEMENT AND CRITICISM OF THE OLD DOCTRINES. 231 
 
 blue glass which according to Lepsius and Helbig' is the 
 mock lapis lazuli which the Egyptians were so fond of 
 making in imitation of the rare and costly real stone which 
 had to be brought from Tartary. Granting then for the sake 
 of argument that the Homeric Talent was a standard intro- 
 duced into Greece from Egypt at a very early period, it by no 
 means follows that this standard has had a scientific origin. 
 The Greeks it will be noticed found it necessary in taking over 
 this standard to equate it to their primitive barter system. If 
 then the process of human development is such that the Greeks, 
 who above all people shewed the most extraordinary power of 
 acquiring civilization, found it necessary even when presented 
 with a ready made standard for metallic currency, to bring it 
 into harmony with their immemorial system of appraising values 
 by means of the cow, there is certainly a strong presumption 
 that the people from whom they derived that metallic standard 
 •had not themselves obtained it by any mathematical process. 
 
 We can hardly doubt that mankind first obtained empirically 
 the art of weighing, and that it was only at a later period that 
 mathematics were called in to fix scientifically the standards 
 obtained by the older and cruder method. Such is the function 
 of mathematics still. Thus Professor Cayley observed (in his 
 address at Stockport), "I said I would speak to you not of the 
 utility of mathematics in any of the questions of common life or 
 of physical science, but rather of the obligations of mathematics 
 to these different subjects. The consideration which thus pre- 
 sents itself is in a great measure that of the history of the 
 development of the different branches of mathematical science 
 in connection with the older physical sciences, Astronomy and 
 Mechanics. The mathematical theory is in the first instance 
 suggested by some question of common life or of physical science, 
 is pursued and studied quite independently thereof, and perhaps 
 after a long interval comes in contact with it or with quite a 
 different question"." 
 
 If such then is the part played by mathematics in an age 
 when even the mathematician has come to the aid of the hang- 
 
 • ' Schliemanu, Tiryns, pi. ii. Helbig, Bae homerisches Epos', p. 79. 
 ■^ Report of the British Association, 1883, p. 21. 
 
2S2 STATEMENT AND CRITICISM OF THE OLD DOCTKINES. 
 
 man, and the wretch meets a well-deserved doom in strict 
 accordance with a mathematical formula, a fortiori must em- 
 pirical discovery have preceded mathematical theory in the 
 second millennium before the Christian era. Just as countless 
 malefactors were successfully executed by empirical Jack Ketches 
 before ever the mathematician turned executioner, so we may 
 be certain that untold sums of gold had been weighed by means 
 of natural seeds and according to a standard empirically obtained 
 before ever the sages of Thebes or Chaldaea had dreamed of 
 applying to metrology the results of their first gropings in 
 Geometry or Astronomy. 
 
PABT II. 
 
CHAPTER X, 
 
 The Systems of Egypt, Babylon, And Palestine, 
 
 We are now in a position to approach the last stage in our 
 task, that which deals with the growth and development of 
 various weight-standards, all of which start from a common 
 unit. Of necessity Egypt, Babylon, Greece and Italy will 
 claim a chief share of our attention. The question now is, 
 Shall we deal with these regions according to the priority of 
 their civilization, that' is, in the order in which I have just 
 named them, or shall we rather adhere to the principle which 
 has hitherto guided us, of working back from that which is 
 better known to that which is less known ? 
 
 On the whole the former is perhaps the better for our pre- 
 sent purpose. As we believe that we have discovered by the 
 inductive method the common unit which lies at the base of 
 all these systems, there is no longer the same necessity for 
 always starting with that which is the less ancient. Besides, 
 if we were nominally to pursue this course, it by no means 
 follows that we would be starting from that which is the best 
 known. Prima facie we ought to start with the Roman system, 
 the tradition of which has remained unbroken down to our own 
 days. We could work back through the system of the Middle 
 Ages to the time of Constantino the Great, from Constantino 
 to the early Empire, and from the Empire to the Republic. 
 Moreover no weight-unit is more accurately known than the 
 Roman pound. But the early history of Rome is so obscure 
 
THE SYSTEMS OF EGYPT, BABYLON, AND PALESTINE. 235 
 
 that we have absolutely no records of a time, when Greece had 
 already a literature of a venerable antiquity. Rome has no 
 literary remains and even not more than a very few meagre 
 inscriptions dating from before the first Punic War (263 — 241 
 B.C.), the very time when Hellas was already far advanced 
 in the autumn of her life. Then Italy had borrowed so 
 much from Hellas that the enquirer must be cautious as to 
 how far he may be dealing with material of true Italian or 
 merely adventitious origin. As we are concerned rather with 
 the origin than with the later developments of weight-sys- 
 tems, it is plain that for dealing with our principal objects the 
 Italian systems present us with no special aid. The late period 
 (268 B.C.) at which the Romans struck silver coins places us 
 at a still further disadvantage if we start with their system. 
 Greece on the other hand presents us not only with abundant 
 literary records of great antiquity, some of them descending from 
 an age which knew not the uses of coined money, but also with 
 thousands of inscriptions cut in marble or bronze, manj'^ of 
 which contain data of great value for dealing with the history 
 of currency and weight, and finally presents us with vast series 
 of coins from which we can learn empirically the coin standards 
 employed in various times and places. But it is the very wealth 
 of material that is in some degree here our difficulty. The special 
 feature of Greek national life was its numerous autonomous 
 states. There was no central authority with a mint which issued 
 coins for a whole empire as was virtually the case in the great 
 Persian kingdom, and at a later period in the Macedonian empire 
 of Alexander the Great. In the palmy days of Hellas each petty 
 state issued its own coinage, following in its silver and copper 
 mintages whatever standard or module it pleased. 
 
 To commence our constructive part with a country where 
 we are confronted mth such an array of separate coinages and 
 of diverse standards would be unwise if it were possible to 
 start from some region where there was a single central au- 
 thority, and consequently less diversity of standards. We 
 are thus led to choose either Egypt or Babylonia as our start- 
 ing point. The former presents to us a system less developed 
 and more simple than the latter. In fact we are tolerably 
 
286 THE SYSTEMS OF EGYPT, BABYLON, AND PALESTINE. 
 
 well justified, in view of recent discussion, in regarding all that 
 is more complex in the system of Egypt as borrowed from 
 Babylonia. Yet it must not be supposed that we escape all 
 difficulties in thus starting with Egypt. If in Hellas we found 
 ourselves embarrassed by the wealth of coinages, in Egypt on 
 the other hand we have no native coinage to guide us, for 
 it was only after the conquest of Egypt by Alexander that 
 under the Greek dynasty founded by Ptolemy Lagos the essen- 
 tially Greek art of coining was introduced into Egypt. We 
 depend therefore for our knowledge of Egyptian standards 
 upon the actual weighings of weight-pieces and such infor- 
 mation as can be gleaned from the ancient Egyptian docu- 
 ments. The same holds good likewise on the whole for the 
 Assyrian system, where however the actual weight-pieces and 
 statements derived from cuneiform inscriptions can in some 
 degree be supported by collateral evidence. At the same time 
 we must be careful not to assign as much importance to the 
 literary evidence supplied to us by Egyptian hieroglyphic or 
 Assyrian cuneiform as we do to the records of Greece or Rome. 
 The keys to the former have only been obtained within the 
 present century, and many of the translations of such docu- 
 ments given us by that brilliant band of savants who have 
 opened to us the portals of a Past far exceeding in antiquity 
 the most remote epoch of which the literatures of Greece and 
 Rome contain even any tradition, must at the best in many 
 cases be considered only as tentative. 
 
 Furthermore although the knowledge gained from actually 
 existing weights, which have been gleaned from the ruins of 
 Nineveh, Khorsabad, or Naucratis, may be regarded as positive 
 and more or less exact, we are met by the difficulty that in the 
 case of Egypt and Assyria, where there was no coined money, 
 we have no means of deciding what class of weight was used for 
 certain kinds of commodities. In Greece and in the countries 
 which formed the Persian empire we can be sure at all events 
 of the standards which were employed in the weighing of gold 
 and silver: the absence of this test is a serious hindrance in 
 the study of Egyptian and Assyrian metrology. It is easy to 
 illustrate by a supposed example the element of uncertainty 
 
THE SYSTEMS OF EGYPT, BABYLON, AND PALESTINE. 237 
 
 introduced. Let us suppose that in ages to come the ruins 
 of some English ironmonger's shop were excavated, and a series 
 of weights was found therein, a set of Avoirdupois weights 
 ranging from a one-hundredweight to half an ounce ; a set of 
 Troy weights ranging from one pound to half a grain, and one 
 of Apothecaries' weights consisting of ounces, drachms, scruples, 
 and grains. Suppose likewise that some ardent metrologist 
 of that age, in addition to this splendid find, should be ahle 
 to add to his material from elsewhere one or two sovereign and 
 half-sovereign weights, a guinea, half-guinea, quarter-guinea, 
 and seven-shilling-piece weight, perhaps even a noble, or a 
 half-noble weight, and then without consulting literary sources, 
 or previously studying the standards on which the English 
 coinage had been struck at different periods, proceeded to re- 
 construct the metrological system of England. It is needless 
 to say that his conclusions would be indeed widely aberrant 
 from the truth. 
 
 Having thus sketched however roughly some of the diffi- 
 culties which beset our path, and after warning the reader that 
 in metrology if anywhere the maxim of the old Sicilian poet 
 is to be observed. 
 
 Sober keep, to doubt inclined be ; 
 Hinges these are of the mindi, 
 
 I shall now proceed to set forth the method in which I con- 
 ceive the various systems gradually rose and expanded. Let us 
 bear in mind the fact already proved that gold was the first 
 of all commodities to be weighed, and that consequently the 
 standards employed for weighing that metal are the most ar- 
 chaic. 
 
 Egypt. 
 
 As has been previously remarked, we are not concerned 
 with the long battle still raging between Assyriologists and 
 Egyptologists as regards the respective claims of Egj^t and 
 Babylonia to the invention of measure and weight-standards. 
 
 1 Nd0e Kal fjU/uiair' iirLtrTelv, dpBpa TdvTO, t&v (ppevwv, Epicharmus, 
 
238 THE SYSTEMS OF EGYPT, BABYLON, AND PALESTINE. 
 
 Boeckh himself seems instinctively to have felt this difficulty. 
 For whilst he took Babylonia as the birthplace and home of 
 all the ancient systems, nevertheless he held that contempo- 
 raneously there must have existed a connection between Egypt 
 and Babylonia in remote antiquity, from which alone certain 
 agreements and relations between the measures and weights 
 of Egypt and Babylonia were capable of explanation'. The 
 primitive measures of length are undoubtedly by the consensus 
 of mankind based upon the parts of the body, such as the 
 finger, the thumb, the foot, the arm, or both arms fully ex- 
 tended, standards common to Egyptians and Chaldaeans alike. 
 Whilst at a later stage in the history of all civilized peoples 
 efforts have been made to obtain more accuracy in these 
 standards, which of necessity have produced certain local and 
 national divergencies, yet inasmuch as all alike started from 
 these standards which have been supplied by nature, it is 
 obvious that many striking similarities and relations will 
 always be found when any comparative study of different 
 systems is attempted. The same principle of course holds 
 good for weight-standards. According to our argument there 
 was a common animal unit existing in Assyria and Egypt, 
 which was represented by a metal unit, prevailing alike in 
 both regions possibly with certain modifications. Egypt and 
 Assyria starting with this common unit, each in their own 
 fashion constructed their distinctive national systems, and we 
 need not be surprised if at a later period under certain political 
 conditions certain parts of the system of one of these regions 
 are found exercising some influence upon that of the other. 
 
 We shall now briefly state the Egyptian weight-system. 
 In the oldest Egyptian documents two weights continually 
 occur, the Kat {Ket or Kite) and the Uten {Ten or Outen). 
 Already in the third millennium before Christ the precious 
 metals were in full use in Egypt, and copper likewise was 
 employed in the purchase of articles of small value. Although 
 very large amounts are recorded, yet they had devised no larger 
 unit than those mentioned. 
 
 ^ Boeckh, Metrol. Untersueh. p. 32. 
 
THE SYSTEMS OF EGYPT, BABYLON, AND PALESTINE. 239 
 
 To M. Chabas belongs the honour of being the first to 
 clear up the relations between the uten and kat. The history 
 of this discovery is an interesting proof of the fruitlessness of 
 the purely empirical form of metrology which confines itself to 
 the measuring of buildings, and weighing of ancient weight- 
 pieces and coins, unless its path is made clear by means of the 
 light derived from ancient records. The names uten and kat 
 had been long known, as both of them recur frequently on the 
 walls of the temple of Karnak {Temp. Thothmes III. 1700 — 
 1600 B.C.), and Egyptian weights were in the museums of 
 Europe, but nevertheless " the exact relation of the one to the 
 other remained unknown until it was fortunately disclosed by 
 a passage in the Harris papyrus, which contains the annals of 
 Rameses III. (circ. 1300 B.C.). From this it appears that the 
 Uten contained ten Kats'." The uten therefore is the tenfold 
 of the kat : Nissen" thinks that the latter was perhaps origin- 
 ally a gold weight (vielleicht ursprunglich ein Ooldgewichi). 
 These two units served for the weighing of gold, silver and 
 copper, and there seems to be no difference noted in the docu- 
 ments between the units used for each purpose. In the lists of 
 booty we read of such sums as 3144 utens of gold and 36692 
 utens of electrum. In lists of prices of commodities kats and 
 utens of silver and copper are frequently mentioned. The 
 weight of the kat has been fixed by Lepsius at 9'096 grammes 
 (142-1 grains) and that of the uten at 90'959 grammes (1421-2 
 grains). But as it often happens in the case of coins that 
 one well-preserved specimen is a better index of the normal 
 standard than any that can be attained by taking the average 
 of 100 bad specimens, so in the case of weights, one good 
 specimen, made of some hard and imperishable substance, will 
 give us a truer representation of the standard unit than the 
 average of a large number of weights made of some less durable 
 material, and carelessly executed, and meant merely for traffic 
 in goods of little value. If such a weight as we have supposed 
 is inscribed with its name, and we can also get some indication 
 
 ^ Head, op. cit. xxvni. 
 
 2 " Grieoh. und rom. Metrologie " (in Iwan Miiller's Handbuch der klass. 
 Alterturmwissenschaft, Vol. i. p. 684). 
 
240 THE SYSTEMS OF EGYPT, BABYLON, AND PALESTINE. 
 
 that it has all the authority that belongs to a weight used for 
 ofBcial purposes, its value becomes still greater. Such a piece 
 fortunately exists in the Harris Collection. It is a beautifully 
 preserved serpentine weight, and weighs 698 grs. Troy. Allow- 
 ing for its extremely slight loss we may suppose its original 
 
 Fig. 22. Egyptian Five-Kat weight (Harris Collection). 
 
 weight to have been about 700 grs. It bears the inscription. 
 Five Kats of the Treasury of On. This gives 140 grains Troy 
 as the weight of the kat'. This inscription also proves that 
 the kat was the unit. For if as is commonly stated the uten 
 is the unit, of which the kat is simply the one-tenth, we must 
 naturally expect to find this weight described as J uten rather 
 than as 5 kats. This is confirmed by a statement of the gram- 
 marian Horapollo (or Horus, who although writing about 
 400 A.D. nevertheless preserves much valuable information) that 
 "with the Egyptians the didrachm is the monad. But the 
 monad is the source of production of all numeration." As 
 two drachms were 135 grs., it is evident that it is the kat of 
 140 grs., and not the uten of 1400 grs. which the Egyptians 
 themselves regarded as the basis of their system ^ Mr Flinders 
 Petrie from the weights of 168 specimens found in the ruins 
 of Naucratis, which range from 136'8 grains to 153 grains, con- 
 cludes that there were two distinct kat units, one weighing 
 
 1 Head, op. cit. xxix. Madden's Jewish Coinage, p. 277. 
 
 ^ Horapollo I. 11, Tap' Alyvn-Tlois fiovis itrnv al Sio Spaxfiai. novas Si vavTii 
 ApLdfiov yivens. ei'Koyuis ovv ras dio SpaxiJ.as (Soi/XA/iEPot STjXwcrai 7i57ra ypd^ovffi, 
 ^Trei f^'^TTjp SoKe't Kal y^petris eTvai, KaB^^ep Kal ij ^ovtis. 
 
THE SYSTEMS OF EGYPT, BABYLON, AND PALESTINE. 241 
 
 142 grs., the other 152 grs. But until some literary evidence is 
 forthcoming for the existence of this second and heavier kat^ 
 we must suspend our judgment. It is perfectly possible that 
 such existed, being used for some purpose different from that 
 of the kat of 140 gi-ains. For instance it might have been 
 used specially for copper owing to a desire to make certain 
 adjustments between silver and copper, but this is of coui-se 
 mere conjecture. 
 
 It is worth while here to see the method by which those who 
 believe in a scientific system of Egyptian origin obtain their unit. 
 
 Signor Bortolotti (Del pnmitivo cubito Egizio) thinks that 
 the uten of 1400 grains is exactly the -^-^ part of the weight of 
 a cubic cubit of Nile water, the cubit in question being not the 
 ordiuarj' royal cubit of 2066 inches, but a measure which he 
 
 ' AY. M, Flinders Petrie, Nntikratis, p. 75. It is with extreme reluctance 
 that I must refuse to follow Mr Petrie, who for careful accuracy and scientific 
 method stands at the head not only of metrologists but of archaeologists in 
 general. But it seems to me that in Ms method of arriving at his weight-units 
 from the weighing of weight-pieces he has overlooked one very important factor. 
 False weights and balances have prevailed in all ages and countries, and we 
 can hardly wrong the ancient Egyptians if we suppose that a certain number 
 of tlieir nation were not as honest as they might have been in their dealings. 
 The valuations in the weights of his specimens given by Mr Petrie may very well 
 be due to false weights. And it must be carefully noted that frauds were not 
 only perpetrated by means of light but also by meajis of too heavy weights. 
 Whetlier tlie Jews learned to cheat when they sojourned in the land of Goshen 
 or not, we cannot say, but that they used too heavy as well as too light weights 
 is plain from the denunciations of the prophets : thus Amos (viii. 5), " When 
 will the new moon be gone that we may sell corn? and the sabbath that we may 
 set forth wheat, making tlie ephah small, and the shekel great, and falsifying 
 the balances by deceit?" See also Ezekiel xlv. 10. But the practice of cheating 
 with too heavy as well as with too light weights is best seen in Deuteronomy 
 XXV. 13 ; " Thou shalt not have in thy bag divers weights, a great and a small; 
 thou shalt not have in thine house divers measures, a great and a small. Thou 
 slialt have a perfect and just weight, a perfect and just measure shalt thou 
 have.'" It seems hardly likely that of the 516 weights found by Mr Petrie ajt 
 Naukratis all were "perfect and just" weights. It is thus quite possible that 
 tlie variations from what there is evidence to suppose is the normal standard, 
 whether they be those of excess or deficiency, may be accounted for, at least in 
 part, by this consideration. Mr Petrie's method, if applied to natural products 
 such as certain kinds of seeds, will of course give the truest possible result, but 
 when the factor of human knavery enters, his method is at once open to serious 
 drawbacks. 
 
 R. 16 
 
242 THE SYSTEMS OF EGYPT, BABYLON, AND PALESTINE. 
 
 calls the primitive Egyptian cubit of 19-71 inches in length. 
 Signor Bortolotti also suggests that the standard uten of Mr 
 Petrie's heavy system was 1486 grains, being the -j-J^ part of 
 the weight of a cubic royal cubit (20-66 inches) in Nile water. 
 But as I have just pointed out the evidence is in favour of 
 the kat being the original unit rather than the uten. Besides 
 if the Egyptians obtained their system for the first time by the 
 scientific process, we ought naturally to find some of those 
 larger units such as the talent and mina, which are found in 
 Egypt at a later epoch. But as we have seen in the case of 
 Greeks, Hebrews, Chinese and Hindus, everywhere weight 
 systems begin with a weight for gold, and this is naturally a 
 small unit. 
 
 There is still one element in this matter which we must not 
 overlook. A certain number of gold rings have been found 
 in Eg3rpt. Their unit is fixed by Lenormant at 8-1 grammes 
 (128 grains). Brandis regarded them as Syrian in origin, and 
 thus got rid of all difficulty. Others regard the rings as evi- 
 dently of Egyptian manufacture, and from finding as they 
 think a corresponding mina appearing in Egypt in Ptolemaic 
 times regard this unit as a genuine ancient Egyptian standard 
 in use long anterior to the Persian conquest. It may thus be 
 very probable that the standard employed in early days in 
 Egypt for gold (and also electrum and silver) was this unit of 
 128 grains, which is of course almost identical with an ox-unit. 
 Silver, according to Erman', was in the time of the oldest 
 Egyptian records more valuable than gold, for in enumeration 
 it is always named before gold, whereas under the later dy- 
 nasties it is named as with us always after gold, shewing that 
 a great change had taken place in the relations between these 
 metals. It is then clearly conceivable that at the outset one 
 and the same unit of about 128 — 30 grains, under the name of 
 kat, served as the unit for both gold and silver (which explains 
 perfectly the fact that an ox is valued at a kat of silver), 
 but that in after days when the change in the relative values 
 of the metals came, there was found a need for a new silver 
 unit, just as the Greeks in certain places found it necessary to 
 ' Erman, Aegypten und Aegypt. Lebeii, p. 611. 
 
THE SYSTEMS OF EGYPT, BABYLON, AND PALESTINE. 243 
 
 form the Aeginetan and other standards, and the Babylonians 
 found themselves compelled to form that standard which alone 
 can with truth be termed the Babylonian, the silver unit of 
 172 grains. 
 
 We have now before us the data for the early Egyptian 
 weight system'. It is simple; the unit is the kat probably 
 based on the ox as we have seen already. The fact that 
 weights formed in the shape of cows and cows' heads are repre- 
 sented in Egyptian paintings as employed in the weighing 
 of rings, indicates that in the mind of the first manufacturer 
 of such weights there was a distinct connection between the 
 shape given to the weight and the object whose value in gold 
 (or silver) it expressed. Specimens of such weights are known, 
 and are always of small size, a sure indication that the com- 
 modity for which they were employed was very precious. 
 The fact that we find weights in the shape of lions can be 
 readily accounted for by the supposition that in the course of 
 time when the connection between the ox and the original 
 weight-unit became forgotten, and different standards had been 
 evolved, some distinctive animal form was adopted to distin- 
 guish the weights of a particular standard. The original unit 
 being thus obtained, the higher unit, the uten, was formed by 
 the method most familiar to all races of men. The fingers of 
 one hand suggested to mankind a simple means of counting ; 
 and the combined fingers of both hands gave them the decimal 
 system. The Egyptians accordingly simply took the tenfold 
 of the ox-unit as their highest unit. As weighing in the 
 earliest stage was confined to the precious metals, this unit was 
 sufficient for all practical needs ^ It will be noticed that the 
 process employed in forming this weight-system is exactly that 
 which we have found in the Chinese and its related systems. 
 The Chinese Hang (tael or ounce) corresponds to the Egyptian 
 
 1 We also find mention of a weight called the pek, which weighed -Tl 
 grammes (11 grains), and was the yi^ part of the uten. Hultsoh, Metrol? p. 37, 
 regards it as a provincial Ethiopian weight. Its awkward relation to the kat 
 and uten seem to show that it did not form part of the genuine Egyptian 
 system. 
 
 ■^ The large copper coins of the Ptolemies of 1450 — 1350 grs. Troy (the flans 
 of which were turned in a lathe) were almost certainly struck on the native uten. 
 
 16—2 
 
244 THE SYSTEMS OF EGYPT, BABYLON, AND PALESTINE. 
 
 kat (or shekel). Under its name of tical or hat we found 
 it as the unit of gold in South-Eastern Asia, and for the 
 weighing of precious metals we found that the highest unit 
 employed was the nm, the tenfold of the original unit, (the 
 tael) itself still the only unit in use in China for the precious 
 metals. In process of time when ordinary commodities of life 
 began to be reckoned by weight, the Chinese made use of the 
 pical (which originally simply meant a man's load) as their 
 highest commercial unit. Much the same process seems to 
 have taken place in Egypt, for in later times we find talents 
 of various kinds in use. Thus the Alexandrine talent which 
 was employed for wood contained 360 utens. Was this talent 
 originally nothing more than a man's load, which in a later 
 and more scientific age was adjusted to the weight standard 
 time out of mind employed for metals ? In this talent of 
 360 utens we can see the influence of the sexagesimal systems 
 of Asia Minor, which, as we shall presently see, was really a 
 commercial standard of comparatively late development and 
 never at any time was employed for the precious metals. The 
 Alexandrine talent of 360 utens contained 3600 kats, just as 
 the royal Babylonian talent contained 3600 shekels. 
 
 The Assyrio-Babylonian System. 
 
 Much has been written in the last thirty years concerning 
 what is known as the Assyrio-Babylonian system : in fact so 
 much has been written that it is difficult to find out the data 
 amidst the masses of theory. What then are the facts which 
 we have to go upon ? Whence do we get the name Babylonian 1 
 Herodotus' tells us that when Darius imposed on his subjects 
 a fixed quota of tribute instead of the occasional gifts and con- 
 tributions which were brought to the king's treasury under the 
 reigns of his predecessors Cyrus and Cambyses, those "who 
 brought silver got orders to bring a talent of Babylonian weight 
 whilst those who brought gold one of Euboic weight. But the 
 
 ^ III. 89, Toiffi /lec airdv dpyipiov dirayiviovcrL dprjTo Ba^vKdinov aTa6u,iv 
 T&XavTov dTayu/ieiv, Toiai S^ XP^"^" dwaywiovai. Eii^oiKdv t& di 'Ba^vKdiviov 
 t6.\ii.vtov divarai ^ii^oiSas i^SoiiiiKOVTa nv4as. 
 
THE SYSTEMS OF EGYPT, BABYLON, AND PALESTINE. 245 
 
 Babylonian talent amounts to seventy Euboic minas." Properly 
 speaking then according to the ancients, the only specific 
 Babylonian talent was one employed for silver and which 
 was one-sixth heavier than the Euboic talent. It is to be 
 noted carefully that the standard employed for the weighing 
 
 Fig. 23. Lion weight. 
 
 of gold is not regarded by Herodotus as peculiar to Babylon 
 or Persia, but is treated as identical with the common Euboic 
 standard which was used for silver in many parts of Greece, 
 and the stater of which was the only standard employed for 
 gold in Greece, even in those states where the Aeginetic system 
 was in use for their silver currency. Thus in the system em- 
 ployed for gold in the empire of the Great King the mina con- 
 tained 50 staters, and the talent 60 minas. But the discovery 
 
 Fig. 24. Assyrian half-shekel weight of the so-called Duck type'. 
 
 A. Side view showing cuneiform symbol = J. 
 
 B. View from above. 
 
 of the weights known as the Lion and the Duck weights by 
 Sir A. H. Layard at Nineveh whilst from one point of view 
 most fortunate, from another may be regarded as the reverse. 
 
 ' This weight (in my own possession) said to have come from India, and 
 almost perfect, weighed 4-29 grammes. 
 
246 THE SYSTEMS OF EGYPT, BABYLON, AND PALESTrNE. 
 
 The large size of many of the weights caused scholars to fix 
 their attention entirely on the larger units, and ever since then 
 all the various efforts to reconstruct the Assyrio-Babylonian 
 weight system have had if nothing else in common at least 
 this that they have all commenced to build the pyramid irom 
 the top downwards. They all took the highest imits, the 
 talent or mina, as their starting-point, and proceeded to evolve 
 from thence the small unit or shekel. Yet all the evidence of 
 antiquity pointed in the opposite direction. In the Greek 
 system, which those scholars held to be borrowed from the East, 
 it was the small unit which was called the stater or " weigher," 
 indicating clearly that it was regarded as the real basis of the 
 standard. 
 
 Again the Phoenicians and Hebrews who from the earliest 
 times were in constant contact with Mesopotamia ought certain- 
 ly to exhibit traces in their earliest extant records of the mina 
 and talent, if it was from these units that the weight-system 
 started. Yet that is not the evidence afforded by the Old 
 Testament. There is no mention of a mina except in Kings, 
 Chronicles, Ezra, and Ezekiel, all books of late date. In the 
 Book of Genesis where sums of money are mentioned, they are 
 reckoned by shekels and nothing else. So when Abraham bought 
 the cave of Machpelah for 600 pieces of silver, what could have 
 been more convenient than to describe the purchase money as 
 consisting of 12 manahs (minasy ? Thus, as we shall see later 
 on, the conclusion to be drawn from the ancient Hebrew writings 
 is the same as that which we draw from the Homeric Poems, 
 that it is the shekel (or stater), the small unit, which was the 
 first to be employed, and that it was only in the course of time 
 that the higher units, the mina and the talent, make their 
 appearance. If according to the common theory the weight 
 standards were the actual creations of either Chaldaeans or 
 Egyptians and only borrowed from them by other peoples, why 
 do we not find the higher units appearing from the first 
 amongst those supposed borrowers, if the other part of the 
 theory is true, that they started from a high unit ? 
 
 1 If, as 13 held by some of the best critics, this is a late passage, there is au 
 a fortiori argument against the early use of the mina. 
 
THE SYSTEMS OF EGYPT, BABYLON, AND PALESTINE. 247 
 
 Now for the evidence of the monuments themselves. 
 
 The weights found by Sir A. H. Layard fall into two classes, 
 (a) those in the shape of Lions, which are made of bronze, and 
 (6) those in the shape of Ducks, which are of stone ^- "The 
 bronze Lions are for the most part furnished with a handle on 
 the back of the animal, and are generally inscribed with a 
 double legend, one in cuneiform characters, the other in Ara- 
 maic." The Ducks which are inscribed have a legend in cunei- 
 form characters only. These inscriptions contain not only the 
 name of the king of Babylon or Assyria in whose reign they 
 were made, but likewise a statement of the number of the 
 minas or fractions of a mina which each weight originally 
 represented. As these weights were found in the ancient 
 palace some have thought that they were possibly official 
 standards of weight deposited from time to time in the royal 
 palaces-. This seems at least to be implied by the inscriptions 
 on some of them, such as those of the largest and most ancient 
 of the Duck weights, which run as follows : 
 
 (1) 'The palace of Irta-Merodach, King of Babylon [circ. 
 B.C. 1050], 30 Manahs '.' 
 
 Wt., 15060'5 grammes, yielding a Mina of 502 gram. 
 
 (2) 'Thirty Manahs of Nabu-suma-libur, King of Assyria,' 
 [date unknown], 
 
 Wt., 14589 gram. 
 
 A small portion of this weight is broken off; if this is 
 
 ' Is it possible that the so-called Vuchs are only degraded forms of bull-head 
 weights? The ears and horns were dropped as being inconvenient (see bull- 
 head weight, p. 283), and at a later time when the tradition of their origin had 
 been lost, the shapeless lump was adorned with a bird's head to serve as a 
 handle. All the large weights from Nineveh are without any head ; and it is 
 but very rarely even on the small haematite weights that the duck's head is 
 found fully formed. 
 
 '' As no better selection of these weights could be made than that of Mr Head, 
 I have followed his description. Cf. E. S. Poole, in Madden's Jewish Coinage, 
 p. 261 seqq., and the Beport of the Warden of the Standards, 1874 — 5, for a full 
 account of these weights. 
 
 5 The Manah is of course the Meneh so familiar from Belshazzar's vision, 
 mene, mene tekel upharsin (Daniel v. 25), which the best scholars follow 
 M. Clermont-Ganneau (Journal Asiatique, 1886) in interpreting as a mina, 
 a mina, a shekel, ajid the parts of a shekel. 
 
248 THE SYSTEMS OF EGYPT, BABYLON, AND PALESTINE. 
 
 allowed for it will yield a Miua of about the same weight as 
 No. 1. 
 
 (3) 'Ten Manahs' (somewhat injured), bears the name of 
 'Dungi; according to George Smith, King of Babylon circ. 
 B.C. 2000. 
 
 Wt., 4986 grain., yielding a Mina of 498-6 gram. 
 
 On three of the Lions we read as follows : 
 
 (1) ' The Palace of Shalmaneser [circ. B.C. 850] King of 
 the Country, two manahs of the King,' in cuneiform characters, 
 and 'Two Manahs' weight of the country' in Aramaic characters. 
 
 Wt., 1992 gram., yielding a Mina of 996 gram. 
 
 (2) ' The Palace of Tiglath-Pileser [circ. B.C. 747], King of 
 the Country, two Manehs' in cuneiform characters. 
 
 Wt., 946 gram., yielding a Mina of 473 gram. 
 
 (3) 'Five Manahs of the King' in cuneiform characteis, 
 and 'Fi\e Manahs' weight of the country ' in Aramaic characters. 
 
 Wt., .5042 gram., yielding a Mina of 1008 gram. 
 
 The results which we obtain from these weights are that 
 there were evidently two standards used side by side in tho 
 Assyrio-Babylonian empire, the Mina of one being about 1010 
 grarn., that of the other about -50.5 gram. In other words one 
 standard was simply the double of the othe)- ; also the weights 
 on which Aramaic legends appear are those which belong to the 
 double standard. Again, there is no evidence that the Talent 
 was as yet conceived, as all the weights are Minae or fractiorjs 
 (or multiples) of Minae. Might we not equally well expect 
 fractions of the Talent, as for instance to find the weight of 
 30 Manahs described as half a Talent, if the Talent already 
 at this period formed part of the system ' ? 
 
 But there is one most important point to be noticed. The 
 single mina of .505 gram, is plainly different from the mina 
 
 ' Prof. Sayce (Academy, Deo. 19th, 1891) publishes a weight from Babylonia 
 inscribed "One maneh standard weight, the property of Merodach-sar-ilani, 
 a duplicate of the weight which Nebuchadrezzar, king of Babylon, the son of 
 Kabopolassar, king of Babylon, made in exact accordance with the weight 
 [prescribed] by the deified Dungi, a former king.'' This confirms my contention 
 that the mivA is jmor in date to the talent. 
 
THE SYSTEMS OF EGYPT, BABYLON, AXD PALESTINE. 249 
 
 of gold, (the Euboic mina of Herodotus) which contained 50 
 shekels, staters (Darics) of 130 grains (8"4 gram.) each. For it 
 would requii-e 50 shekels of 10'5 gram. (164 grains) each to 
 make a mina of 505 gram. On the other hand it will be found 
 that if we take 60 shekels of the Daric or ox-imit weight they 
 will exactly make up the mina of 505 gram. Neither can this 
 mina be the Babylonian silver mina of 50 shekels of 172 grains 
 (11"2 gram.) each. For the Babylonian silver mina consists of 50 
 shekels of 11 "2 gram., whereas the mina of 505 gram, would give 
 50 shekels of only lO'l gram. each. The obvious conclusion is 
 that this mina of 505 gram, is neither the gold nor the silver 
 standard. It is a mina composed of 60 shekels of the weight of 
 the gold unit (Daric or ox-unit). And its talent was composed 
 when the system was completed, of 60 minae, as was the case 
 with all other talents. From the weights just described it may 
 reasonably be assumed that both the heavy and light systems 
 were employed contemporaneously in the As.syrio-Babylonian 
 empire. Some have suggested that whilst the light system was 
 employed in Babylon, its double, or the heavy one, was em- 
 ployed in the northern part of the empire. But the fact that it 
 is on the weights of the latter standard that we find the double 
 legends, the second being in Aramaic characters, seems to point 
 irresistibly to the conclusion that the heavy standard (no 
 matter what it may have been employed for) was especially 
 used in Syria. 
 
 It is of great significance that it is in this very quarter we 
 find in use as the gold unit not our usual Daric or ox-unit, but 
 its double, which is commonly known as the heavy gold shekel 
 of 260 gi-ains. I have suggested elsewhere that the explanation 
 of this may be due to the fact that among certain peoples, 
 especially those who dwelt after the fashion of the Sidonians, 
 quiet and full of riches, and who had passed from the life 
 pastoral into the settled agricultural stage, the yoke or pair of 
 oxen would readily be regarded as the unit instead of the single 
 ox of primitive days. The fact that a zeugos or yoke of oxen 
 was taken as the unit of assessment by Solon for the third of 
 the Athenian classes lends some support to this view" We have 
 
 1 Cf. Plautus, Per$a. 
 
250 THE SYSTEMS OF EGYPT, BABYLON, AND PALESTINE. 
 
 likewise seen how the ancient Irish, after borrowing the Roman 
 ounce, and equating an ounce of silver to the cow, made for their 
 silver a higher unit by taking three ounces, which represented 
 three cows, the ordinary price of a female slave {ciimhal). 
 
 The Phoenicians employed the double shekel as their unit, 
 but there is evidence to show that the light shekel was the 
 original unit. We have seen that in Egypt, Palestine and 
 Greece, from the remotest time, gold circulated in the form 
 of rings made of a fixed amount of gold, and also that the 
 unit on which they were made was our ox unit, or light shekel 
 (130—5 grains). From the practice of using gold rings in 
 currency as well as for ornament, we may safely conclude that 
 the standard of 130 grains upon which these were probably 
 made was far anterior to the use of the double shekel in Syria 
 and Phoenicia. 
 
 The standards which we have learned from the weights 
 found at Nineveh and Khorsabad are now generally known as 
 the light royal talent, and the heavy royal talent, because on 
 specimens of both standards the inscriptions describe them as 
 weights " of the king.'' 
 
 It is evident that as gold and silver had each a separate 
 standard, the " royal " standards were not employed for the 
 precious metals. It is then most probable that they were 
 employed for the weighing of the inferior metals such as copper, 
 which of course played a most important part in the daily life 
 of both Babylonians and Assyrians. We may rest assured that 
 corn was not weighed but continued to be bought and sold by 
 dry measure, as it was with the Hebrews in the days of the 
 Prophets, when the Homer and the Ephah were employed to 
 measure it. 
 
 I shall now give a tabular view of the three standards used by 
 the peoples of Mesopotamia and their neighbours, treating the 
 heavy royal talent as merely the double of the light one. 
 
 Gold. 
 
 1 Stater = 130 grs. Troy (8-4 gram.). 
 50 Staters = 1 Mina = 6500 grs. (4200 gram.). 
 60 Minae = 1 Talent = 390000 grs. 
 
the systems of egypt, babylon, and palestine. 251 
 
 Silver. 
 1 Shekel = 172 grs. 
 50 Shekels = 1 Manah = 8600 grs. 
 60 Manahs = 1 Talent = 516000 grs. 
 
 Royal Standard. 
 
 1 Shekel = 130grs. (8-4 gi-am.). 
 60 Shekels = 1 Manah = 7800 grs. 
 60 Manahs = 1 Talent = 468000 grs. 
 
 Let us now examine for a moment the current explanation 
 of the origin and inter-relations of these standards and we shall 
 find that they all start at the wrong end, assuming as earliest 
 that which can be proved to be later, and deducing what are 
 really the earliest stages from those which were in fact the 
 historical outcome of the others. 
 
 " The proficiency of the Chaldaeans in the cognate sciences 
 of Arithmetic and Astronomy is well known ''■'. The broad 
 and monotonous plains of lower Mesopotamia had nothing to 
 attract the ejh, and impelled their inhabitants to fix their 
 attention upon the overarching skies studded with stars 
 that shone with exceptional clearness and lustre in the dry 
 pellucid atmosphere of that region. There were no dark 
 mountains looming in the distance to hinder the eye from 
 watching down to the very horizon the heavenly bodies in their 
 periodic movements. Thus as Geometry may be regarded as 
 the special offspring of the Egyptian mind, so Astronomy and 
 Astrology were the children of Babylonia. The results of their 
 astronomical observations were duly recorded on clay tablets in 
 the cuneiform characters, and these tablets were then baked 
 hard, and stored up in the great libraries in their chief cities. 
 It is recorded that when Alexander the Great captured Babylon, 
 he obtained and forwarded to his tutor Aristotle a series of 
 astronomical records extending back as far as the year B.c. 2234, 
 according to our reckoning." 
 
 Certain investigations into these tablets, primarily suggested 
 by a fragment of Berosus which desci-ibed the method of divi- 
 
 1 Brandis, 20—38. - Head, xxix. 
 
252 THE SYSTEMS OF EGYPT, BABYLON, AND PALESTINE. 
 
 ding time employed by the Babylonians, have led scholars to 
 conclude that upon these observations " rests the entire struc- 
 ture of the metric system of the Babylonians \" 
 
 Thus was obtained the famous Babylonian Sexagesimal 
 system. Although the French metric system of modern days 
 has returned to the decimal system, which was the first em- 
 ployed by primitive men, being probably suggested to them by 
 those natural counters, the fingers, the sexagesimal had a con- 
 siderable superiority over the older decimal system (which the 
 Egyptians had clung to) for certain practical purposes, as the 
 number on which it was based could be resolved into fractions 
 far more conveniently than the number 10. Dr Hultsch 
 (Metrologie^, p. 393) arrives at the Babylonian weight-unit 
 thus : the Babylonian maris is equal to one-fifth of the cube 
 of the Royal Babylonian Ell, which is itself obtained from the 
 sun's apparent diameter. The weight in water corresponding 
 to this measure of capacity gave the light Royal Babylonian 
 Talent ; this Talent was divided into 60 Minae, and each Mina 
 into sixty parts or Shekels. Their gold Talent w;as derived from 
 the sixtieth of this Royal Mina, with the modification that now 
 fifty sixtieths of the Royal Mina made a Mina of gold and 
 sixty Minae made a Talent". 
 
 It seems strange that the framers of this theory did not 
 consider that just as undoubtedly the Chaldaeans must have 
 reckoned their time by the primitive methods of sunrise, 
 noon and sunset, "full market," or ox-loosing time for cen- 
 turies before they arrived at their scientific division of time, 
 and just as the Chaldaean artificer employed his fingers or 
 palm, or span or foot, as a measure of length ages before the 
 Ruyal Cubit was equated to the sun's apparent diameter, so in 
 all probability they employed as measures of capacity, gourds 
 or eggshells (as did the Hebrews) and for weights the seeds of 
 plants. 
 
 1 Berosus. Synkelloa 30, 6 (Eusebii chronic, ed. Alfr. Schoene vol. i. col. 8) : 
 dXV 6 /xh Bripufffftis dik (rapuiv Kal vr)pav Kal aiixmuv dveypatparo- Civ o fikv ffapos 
 TpiffX'Xiw Koi e^a.Koalwv iruv xpofov aTumlvu, 6 d^ i/fpos iruv i^aKoalav, 6 Si 
 auffaos i^i/jicoi'Ta. Fragm. Script. Hist. Graec. 
 
 ^ Hultsch, op. cit. p. 407. 
 
THE SYSTEMS OF EGYPT, BABYLON, AND PALESTINE. 253 
 
 But since, after what we have already seen, it is perfectly 
 clear that the first of articles to be weighed is gold, and that 
 the unit of weight is consequently small, we at once join issue 
 with several points in the theory of Brandis and his school. 
 First they start with the Talent as the unit, and only arrive at 
 the shekel (the weight par excellence) by a twofold process of 
 subdivision ; secondly, it is assumed that the Royal Talent which 
 we have had reason to believe was a purely commercial Talent, 
 seeing that it was employed neither for gold or silver, was the 
 first to be invented, and that it was only at a later stage that 
 the mina and talent specially employed for gold were developed, 
 not out of the primal unit obtained originally from the one- 
 fifth of the cube of the maris, but from the sixtieth of the 
 mina of that Royal Talent; thirdly one asks in wonder why did 
 the Chaldaeans, who only achieved their famous Sexagesimal 
 system after gazing at the stars through unnumbered genera- 
 tions, abandon this precious discovery the very moment they 
 set about the construction of a weight-unit for gold, for instead 
 of taking one-sixth of the cube of the maris, they are repre- 
 sented as following their old decimal system with invincible 
 obstinacy by taking one-fifth of the maris as their point of 
 departure ; lastly, it is astonishing that the Chaldaeans did not 
 employ their new discovery in the weighing of the precious 
 metals, the thing which above all others ought to have called 
 for the most scientific accuracy. 
 
 The fact is, that just as children find some difficulty in 
 realising that their parents were ever children, so when we 
 stand in the presence of the remains of the great cities of 
 Egypt and Babylonia, those ancients of the earth, we are too 
 prone to forget that Thebes, Babylon or Nineveh had ever 
 their day of small things. The familiar tale of Romulus and 
 Remus with their band of outlaws dwelling in their hovels 
 beside the Tiber has kept people in mind that " Rome was not 
 built in a day." If we can but just approach the question of 
 the first beginnings of Egyptian or Chaldaean civilization with 
 the same idea, it will be far easier to project ourselves into the 
 past of those great races, and thus to realize far better the con- 
 ditions under which they grew and lived. 
 
254 THE SYSTKMS OF EGYPT, BABYLON, AND PALESTINE. 
 
 There can be little doubt that the unit of the Babylonian 
 system was the light shekel (Daric or ox-unit) of 130—5 grs. 
 Troy. But I have shown that the Chaldaeans were aware of 
 and made use of the method of fixing weight-units by means 
 of grains of com such as we have found to be the universal 
 practice from Ireland to China, and we have at once removed 
 all need for supposing that it was only when they had dis- 
 covered a scientific method of metrology that the Chaldaeans 
 constructed their weight-unit. 
 
 After what we have shown upon p. 115 concerning the 
 methods employed in the buying and selling of corn, where it 
 has been made clear that of all commodities com is one of the 
 very last to be weighed because of its bulkiness in proportion 
 to its cheapness, I think no one will readily accept M. Aure's 
 ingenious hypothesis \ 
 
 Are we not now justified in supposing that, just as the 
 peoples of Mesopotamia had marked their seasons and time by 
 primitive methods, and used their fingers and hands and feet 
 as measures long before they dreamed of scientific methods, 
 so that likewise they had employed for weighing their gold the 
 natural weight-unit which lay ready to their hands in the 
 wheat-ears that crowned their plains. 
 
 Let us now start with the light shekel as our unit. Ac- 
 cording to our argument it was nothing more than the amount 
 of gold which represented the value of the cow, the unit of 
 barter throughout all Europe, Asia and Africa, as it still is 
 over considerable areas of both the latter continents. There is 
 no reason for not believing that as among other people, all 
 articles of property, utensils, weapons, clothes, ornaments and 
 the various kinds of animals stand to one another in well- 
 known relations of value, so the same principle was in full 
 force among the Semites of Mesopotamia. We found that 
 the wild tribes of Laos had a regular scale commencing with 
 a hoe as their lowest unit, leading up through kettles and 
 porcelain jars to the buffalo, their main unit ; we also found 
 
 1 Recueil des travwux relatifs n In Fhiloloqie et I'ArcMolociie Eifyptiennes et 
 Assijriennes, Vol. x. fasc. 4, ji. 157. 
 
THE SYSTEMS OF EGYPT, BABYLON, AND PALESTINE. 255 
 
 that the weight of a grain of com in gold was equated to a 
 hoe, and that thus by a simple process of multiplication it was 
 easy to ascertain the value of a buffalo in gold. The unit thus 
 attained was kept from fluctuating, as it was known to every 
 one how many grains of corn gave the true weight of the unit. 
 The practical accuracy of this method of fixing monetary units 
 has been demonstrated from the case of the Early English and 
 Mediaeval English silver penny (p. 180). There is complete 
 evidence to show that the light shekel system was older than 
 the heavy system. Firstly the so-called Duck weights with their 
 cuneiform inscriptions point to the fact that Babylonia was the 
 special home of this system, whilst the Lion weights with their 
 Aramaic inscriptions point to a later period, when the Assyrian 
 Empire was in immediate touch with the merchants of Phoe- 
 nicia. But, in the next place, a far more powerful argument can 
 be drawn from the Hebrew system. In later times the heavy 
 shekel system prevailed in Palestine, in accordance with which 
 the maneh contained 50 heavy or double shekels of 200 grs. 
 each. But that this maneh was simply imposed on the older 
 light shekel system is demonstrated from the fact that when 
 in two parallel passages articles of a certain weight of gold are 
 mentioned, in the one the weight is given at three manehs, in 
 the other at 300 shekels, the maneh thus being counted at 
 100 shekels. These 100 shekels are equal to the 50 heavy 
 shekels of the heavy Assyrian or Aramaic maneh. Now it is 
 evident that if the heavy system had been the original one 
 employed by the Hebrews, the maneh would simply have been 
 reckoned at 50 (heavy) shekels. As the matter stands it is 
 evident that on the contrary, the heavy mina was introduced 
 into a system where the unit was simply the light shekel, and 
 the Hebrews therefore clinging to their old unit, described the 
 maneh as consisting of 100 shekels instead of 50. Further 
 evidence to the same effect will be adduced later on. Finding 
 thus the light shekel in Babylonia, in Palestine and in Egypt, 
 and current even under the Assyrian Empire side by side with 
 the heavy system even amongst people who used the Aramaic 
 system of writing, we may without any hesitation regard it as 
 the older. 
 
256 THE SYSTEMS OF EGYPT, BABYLON, AND PALESTINE. 
 
 The process by which the gold Talent was arrived at was 
 somewhat thus : 
 
 The ox-unit of 130 — 135 grs. is the basis. 
 
 Next the fivefold of this was taken, whether from five being 
 the simplest multiple, since it was suggested from the primi- 
 tive method of counting by the fingers of one hand, or far less 
 likely from a slave being estimated at 5 oxen, somewhat as 
 we find among the Homeric Greeks an ordinary slave-woman 
 estimated at four cows, and in ancient Ireland at three cows. 
 This weight is known as the Assyrian five-shekel standard, and 
 from it Mr Petrie derives the 80-grain standard which he 
 detects as the unit of a certain number of weights found at 
 Naucratis {Naukratis, p. 86). Whilst the Egyptians contented 
 themselves with the 5 ket and 10 ket, or uten, as their highest 
 unit, the Chaldaeans advanced to the fifty-fold (5 x 10), and 
 thus obtained that which probably for a long time formed their 
 highest unit. 
 
 What was this Maneh? Is it a Semitic word or is it rather 
 an Aryan, as the present writer has argued elsewhere ' ? At 
 all events it is interesting to find the appearance of a similar 
 word in the Rig Veda and that too in connection with 
 gold: this has been regarded by some as a loan word from 
 Babylon 2. But it is equally possible, that it is a "loan 
 word " from India to Babylon. The maneh evidently belongs 
 to a period anterior to the development of the sexagesimal 
 system, for if it had come into use along with or subsequent to 
 that system, we should certainly find 60 instead of 50 shekels 
 in the mina of gold and the mina of silver : hence it cannot in 
 any wise be regarded as a distinctive feature of the Babylonian 
 scientific system, as it plainly existed at the time when the 
 decimal system was still dominant. As the latter was the 
 system which prevailed among the Indians of the Vedic period 
 there was no reason why they should borrow the Chaldaean 
 term. On the contrary there is rather a reason why the 
 Chaldaeans would have borrowed the term from India. Gold 
 did not pass into India from Babylonia, for as we have already 
 
 ' Eaeji in Fleckeiaen's Jahrbiicher, 1880, first calls attention to this word. 
 2 Hultsoh, Metrol.^, p. 181. 
 
THE SYSTEMS OF EGYPT, BABYLON, AND PALESTINE. 257 
 
 seen there are no auriferous strata in Mesopotamia, but it 
 passed from the rich surface deposit of the valley of the Oxus 
 and Central Asia into Chaldaea. Now if the same term inti- 
 mately associated with the same commodity is found among 
 two different peoples, and it is known as a matter of certainty 
 that one of these countries supplies the other with this par- 
 ticular article, there is a considerable probability that the 
 peculiar term connected with the commodity has passed along 
 with it from the source of its production into the country which 
 imports it. 
 
 We saw above that there was no native gold in Chaldaea 
 and therefore it must have been imported by those Chaldaean 
 merchantmen from India by way of the Persian Gulf. But was 
 there no gold in Chaldaea until the shipmen of Ur were able 
 to construct vessels capable of a voyage, even albeit only a 
 coasting voyage, to the mouths of the Indus ? Working in 
 metals must have been far advanced when such ships were 
 built. That gold came from India we can have little doubt. 
 But it probably came overland for ages before anything in 
 the form of a ship larger than a 'dug-out' had ever floated on 
 the Indian Seas. 
 
 The first voyage undertaken to the ancient El Dorado may 
 have been to search for the region from whence came the gold, 
 somewhat in the fashion that in after-times Pytheas of Massalia 
 sallied forth to investigate the sources of the tin and amber 
 which reached Marseilles overland from Britain and the Baltic. 
 After weighing these considerations we shall be careful to avoid 
 any dogmatic declarations as to the origin of the word mana. 
 One thing however is clear, and that is that the ancient Hindus 
 were employing certain lumps of gold probably of uniform size 
 in Vedic times, as we saw\ The Indians of the Vedic times had 
 thus a gold unit of their own (and as we have shown above pro- 
 bably based on the value of a cow) before they as yet knew the 
 use of silver or had as yet reached the sea in their downward 
 advance into the peninsula of Hindustan. Even granting that 
 they borrowed the Mana from Babylonia, it is plain that they 
 had already their own gold unit, for otherwise instead of em- 
 1 Big Veda, Mandala, vi. 47, 23—4. 
 R. 17 
 
258 THE SYSTEMS OF EGYPT, BABYLON, AND PALESTINE. 
 
 ploying hiranya pinda, a most primitive term meaning only 
 gold-lump, they would certainly have borrowed the term shekel 
 along with the maneh. But the fact of most importance for us 
 at present is that, whether maneh be Semitic or Aryan, in either 
 case it seems to mean not a weight but a measure. It will be 
 remembered that we found the oatti/ or pound of Further 
 Asia was in origin a natural unit of capacity, as was shown by 
 its Cambodian name neal, which simply means a cocoa-nut, and 
 that we found in China the joints of the bamboo of certain 
 sizes serving as their measures of capacity, and both cocoa-nuts 
 and bamboo joints among the Malays of the Indian Isles. This 
 will naturally suggest the question. Is it possible that the 
 maneh had a somewhat similar origin ? Was some natural 
 object, such as the gourd, which is at the present moment the 
 ordinary unit of capacity at Zanzibar, taken to serve as a measure 
 of liquids or of corn? It is probable that the Greek cyathus 
 (KiiaOo<i) like its Latin congener cucurbita meant originally some 
 kind of gourd. But there is a certain amount of probability 
 that the Semitic peoples used gourds in primitive times for 
 vessels, not simply from d priori considerations, but from the 
 fact that the most archaic pottery obtained by Mr Petrie from 
 his excavations on the site of the ancient city of Lachish in 
 1890 show unmistakable signs of being modelled after the shape 
 of a gourd. Although the Chinese never have employed their 
 ching (catty) for the precious metals, yet the Cambodians have 
 advanced to counting silver not only by the catty but also by 
 the picul. Did then the Babylonians make 50 shekels of gold 
 or silver roundly equal to their maneh or measure of capacity ? 
 This is of course pure speculation, but it is at least supported 
 by the comparison of what has actually taken place elsewhere ; 
 and even from the empire of the Great King himself can we 
 get an insight into the method by which the maneh (and likewise 
 the Talent) may have been brought into the weight system. 
 Herodotus^ tells us that when the tribute of gold (largely in 
 gold dust) and silver was brought to the Kiag he stored it thus: 
 " he melts it and pours it into earthenware jars, and when he 
 has filled the vessels he strips off the earthenware, and when- 
 
 1 Herod, in. 96. 
 
THE SYSTEMS OF EGYPT, BABYLON, AND PALESTINE. 259 
 
 ever he wants money, he cuts off as much as he needs on each 
 occasion." We saw above that the Cambodian catty of silver 
 is twice the weight of the catty of rice, the Cambodian catty 
 being simply the cocoanut, the ordinary unit of capacity, which 
 after being filled with rice or silver and then weighed has 
 given two different catties. The Great King no doubt poured 
 his gold into jars of known capacity, and the weight of such 
 a jar when filled with gold was well known. It seems then 
 not unlikely that in this way from either a jar, or from the 
 gourd which preceded the jar, the mina was derived. How- 
 ever the maneh may have been determined, it is fairly certain 
 that the Babylonians fixed upon 50 as a convenient multiple 
 of the gold unit when silver first came into use; as we have 
 seen above it was probably equal if not superior in value 
 to gold and it was naturally weighed by the same unit. But 
 in the course of time as it became more plentiful, and at the 
 same time if likewise the art of weighing began to be employed 
 by merchants in the traffic in the costly spices and balsams 
 of the east, a necessity would be specially felt among traders for 
 a somewhat heavier unit than the original shekel. Possibly 
 then the Aramaean merchants adopted the double shekel 
 (based on the double ox-unit) for the purpose of weighing silver 
 (when that metal had now become much more plentiful than 
 gold), and for trade in precious gums and spices. Such a 
 procedure can be well paralleled by the old English pound of 
 silk, which is simply two pounds Troy weight. Silk was of 
 course of great value, and was accordingly weighed after the 
 same system as the precious metals ; but when it became less 
 costly and more abundant the weight unit was simply doubled. 
 We may therefore regard the doubling of the original shekel 
 as an early step towards the development of a commercial 
 standard. It is not difiicult to understand how in the course of 
 time a nation of traders like the Phoenicians preferred this 
 double standard even for their gold, and made it perhaps, as we 
 shall shortly see, the basis of their silver standard. 
 
 We saw above that there is every reason to believe that 
 when silver first became known to mankind, they esteemed it 
 as highly as gold, if not more so. It would naturally, there- 
 
 17—2 
 
260 THE SYSTEMS OF EGYPT, BABYLON, AND PALESTINE. 
 
 fore, be weighed on the same standard as gold. This would 
 continue until, in the course of years, a time came when the 
 relation between gold and silver had become fairly fixed over 
 all Asia Minor. We know that in the beginning of the 5th 
 cent. B.C. gold was to silver as 13 : 1 (or rather 13'3 : 1). 
 Herodotus, in the celebrated passage in which he describes 
 the organisation of the Persian empire into satrapies, and 
 details the amount of tribute appointed by Darius for each, 
 tells us that the gold was reckoned at thirteen times the 
 value of silver. Now for ordinary purposes of exchange this 
 relation would be extremely inconvenient, and the more accu- 
 rate relation of 13,"3 : to 1 would be still more so. It became 
 thus desirable to fix some separate standard for silver by which 
 a convenient number, such as 10, of silver ingots would be 
 equal to the gold ingot of the ox -unit standard. Metrologists 
 are wont to speak of the desirability of being able to exchange 
 a round number of talents of silver for a talent of gold. But 
 not even in the palmiest days of the wealthy Orient lands 
 was the ordinary individual so rich that he felt any incon- 
 venience in the way of exchanging talents of gold and silver. 
 The Great King might deal out talents as he pleased, but his 
 subjects were chiefly concerned with the exchange of silver 
 and gold shekels. I have made this remark because it ap- 
 pears to me that many of the misconceptions connected with 
 this whole subject have arisen from scholars concentrating all 
 their attention on the talent, and taking it as their point of 
 departure. 
 
 The Babylonians arrived at their silver standard as follows : 
 1 gold shekel of 130 grs. was worth 1730 grs. of silver 
 (130 X 13"3), since gold was to silver as 13'3 : 1. 
 130 grs. gold = 1730 grs. silver. 
 They divided this amount of silver by 10, and thus : 
 1 gold shekel of 130 grs. = 10 silver shekels of 173 grs. 
 As we stated already, Herodotus says that the Babylonian 
 talent was equal to 70 Euboic minas, that is, one-sixth more 
 than the Euboic talent. The latter contained 390,000 grs. 
 Troy, therefore the Babylonian ought to give 455,000 grs. If 
 we multiply our silver shekel by 50 and then by 60, we shall 
 
THE SYSTEMS OF EGYPT, BABYLON, AND PALESTINE. 261 
 
 obtain a total amount for the talent of silver of 519,000 grs. 
 Unfortunately several inaccuracies have crept into the text of 
 Herodotus, numerals always being especiallj" liable to cor- 
 ruption in ilSS. He seems, however, to have regarded the 
 relation of the Euboic to the Babylonian talent as about that 
 of 5:6, and also to have estimated the current weight of the 
 Persian silver piece at about 162 grs. Troy. But there can be 
 little doubt that the full standard weight of the Babylonian 
 silver shekel was 169 grs. (or, according to Mr Head, 172"9 grs.). 
 From this it is easy to construct the Babylonian silver 
 system, which was employed in Lydia and in the Persian 
 empire. 
 
 1 shekel =169 grs. 
 50 shekels = 1 mina = 7450, 
 
 60 minae = 1 talent 447000. 
 
 From the double gold shekel was formed another silver 
 standard known as the Phoenician. 
 Gold being to silver as 13 : 1, 
 1 double shekel of 260 grs. = 3380 grs. silver, 
 
 3380 grs. silver = 15 shekels of 225*3 grs. 
 
 As this silver standard is found in the same area as the 
 double gold shekel, I have thought it best to follow the usual 
 derivation, but at the same time it is worth pointing out that 
 it may have been gained directly from the light shekel. 
 
 The light shekel (which in the form of coined money ap- 
 pears either as the gold of Croesus, or the Daric), in the case 
 of the Babylonian system was made equal to ten silver di- 
 drachms, or 20 drachms known under the name of Sigh ; it 
 likewise is equal in value to 15 Phoenician didrachms of 
 112"6 grs. Thus, whilst in one region they obtained a silver 
 unit, ten of which would be an equivalent to the gold unit, 
 in another they formed a silver unit, 15 of which would be 
 equivalent to the same gold unit of 130 grs. In each case a 
 number convenient for purposes of exchange was substituted 
 for the extremely unmanageable number 13 (or still more in- 
 tractable 13-3) of the older system, according to which silver 
 was made into ingots of the same size as those of gold. 
 
262 THE SYSTEMS OF EGYPT, BABYLON, ANC PALESTINE. 
 
 These now are the systems on which depended all ti-affic 
 and currency of the precious metals thj-oughout Western Asia 
 for many centuries. I have been compelled in the statement 
 of the two silver systems to anticipate one step in the growth 
 of the fully developed weight system by speaking of the Taknt. 
 We have seen that the mina of silver, like that of gold, con- 
 tains only 50 shekels, thus e\-idently having likewise been de- 
 veloped before the full elaboration of the Chaldaean system of 
 numeration, or at least before the application of that system 
 to their metric standards. But when we come to deal with 
 the talent we find that in every case alike, whether it be the 
 gold, silver, or royal talent of commerce, the talent invariably 
 consists of sixty miuae. From this we may with s;\fety infer 
 that it was at a period posterior to the invention of the sexa- 
 gesimal method that the Talent was added to the gold and 
 silver systems. When we turn to the royal system (both light 
 and heavy), we find that the mina consists of si.ity shekels, just 
 as the talent consists of 60 minae, and consequently we are 
 constrained to believe that this royal system was fixed at a 
 date long after the gi-owth of the gold and silver minae, and 
 when the sexagesimal system had now complete sway. We 
 have already seen good reason for considering the ro>/al talent 
 to be essentially a mercantile imit. It certainly was not used 
 for gold or silver. Corn was not sold by weight, and so in 
 all probability it was meant for copper, iron, lead, and mer- 
 chandise of value. We have learned from our studies in the 
 metal trade of primitive peoples that copper and iron are not 
 weighed but ai'e sold by measurement, being wrought into baa^ 
 or plates of a well defined size. It is only when communities 
 are well advanced in culture that they begin to employ the 
 scales for the buying and selling of the common metals. We 
 argued above that the double shekel system arose from a desire 
 amongst a nation of traders like the Phoenicians for a heavier 
 standard, more serviceable for such goods as were less valuable 
 than gold. It was probably the same desire which found its 
 complete realization in the royal system. Whilst gold and 
 silver had only the mina as their highest unit, there was a 
 new system developed scientifically from the ancient shekel or 
 
THE SYSTEMS OF EGYPT, BABYLON, AND PALESTINE. 263 
 
 ox-unit. The sixty-fold of this unit was taken to form a mina 
 considerably heavier than the old gold mina, and now a new 
 higher unit, the sixty-fold of the mina, was introduced. This 
 we know under its Greek name of talent, bat it was called 
 kikkar in the Semitic languages. Now are we to suppose that 
 this kikkar or talent was purely and simply nothing more than 
 a higher unit formed by taking a convenient multiple of the 
 lower unit, just as in the French metric system the kilogram 
 is 1000 times the gramme ; or was it rather some ancient 
 natural unit, originally formed empirically, and at a later epoch, 
 when science had advanced, fitted into the system of com- 
 mercial weight by being made exactly the sixty-fold of the 
 mina ? Comparison with other systems in various lands will 
 incline us to the latter alternative. If we enquire for a 
 moment in what manner the highest unit of weight for 
 merchandise is fixed among barbarous and semi-civilized na- 
 tionalities, we shall find that the load, that is, the amount 
 that a man of average size and strength can carry, is the 
 universal unit. Readers of the various recent books of African 
 travel frequently meet in their dreary and monotonous pages 
 allusions to so many loads for which porters have to be sup- 
 plied. The amount of the load seems to vary in different 
 parts. Thus amongst the Madi or Moru tribe of Central 
 Africa, a pure negro race, according to that admirable ob- 
 server Mr Felkin, the load is about 50 lbs. in weight, whilst 
 according to Major Barttelot, the load carried by the Zanzi- 
 baris on the Emin Pacha Relief expedition was 65 lbs. (besides 
 the man's own rations for several days). We have already 
 had occasion to refer to the picul of Eastern Asia, which we 
 found was simply the Malay word for a load; and we also 
 found that the load varied in different places. Finally, we 
 found that the Chinese had introduced the picul into their 
 system of commercial weight, fixing it at 100 chings (catties), 
 but at the same time excluded it from theii- silver and gold 
 system, where the tael (ounce) has remained always the highest 
 unit. Yet in Cambodia we find that the further step has been 
 made, and that the commercial system of the catty and picul 
 has been called into service for the weighing of silver. In 
 
264 THE SYSTEMS OF EGYPT, BABYLON, AND PALESTINE. 
 
 Java, whilst gold and silver are weighed by units of small 
 size, copper is sold by the picul. 
 
 It seems to me not unreasonable to suppose that the origin 
 of the talent has been analogous to that of the jpicul. There is 
 certainly nothing in either the Hebrew Idkkar or the Greek 
 takmton to imply in the slightest degree that they represented 
 a numerical multiple of the "mina. The Greek word means 
 simply a weight, whilst the Hebrew seems to mean nothing 
 more than a round mass or cake of anything, whether applied 
 to a tract of country, as the region round the Jordan (as in 
 Nehemiah vii. 28), or a loaf of bread (Exodus xxix. 23 ; 1 Samuel 
 ii. 36). For as the talent was only introduced into the Hebrew 
 system at a late period the term was probably applied to a 
 cake or pig of copper or iron the weight of the ordinary load. 
 That there was a direct connection between the kikkar and a 
 man's load seems implied by the fact that Naaman " bound two 
 talents of silver in two bags, with two changes of garments, and 
 laid them upon two of his servants ; and they bare them before 
 him'' (2 Kings v. 23). As we find Naaman asking Elisha for 
 "two mules' burden of earth" (v. 17) it is at least certain that 
 the Semites regularly estimated bulky weights by some kind of 
 load. We saw above that in Assyrian the same ideogram stands 
 for tribute and talent. If a load of com was the regular 
 unit for tribute, the use of a single ideogram may be ex- 
 plained. In the case of talanton we have no difficulty in 
 directly regarding it as a load, whilst with kikkar it is not 
 difficult to see how easy it was for the meaning of a load of 
 a certain weight to spring from the earlier meaning of the 
 word. Its use as a loaf is interesting in connection with the 
 fact noted on p. 1-59 that in Annam the largest unit in use for 
 gold and silver is called a loaf. 
 
 When under a strong central government a metric system 
 more or less scientific was introduced at Babylon, it was 
 natural that an accurate adjustment of the old empirical unit 
 of merchandise, the load, to the mina and shekel should be 
 carefully carried out, just as in China the Mathematical Board 
 have fijced the picul of commerce as the hundred fold of the 
 ching (catty), giving it a value equal to 133^ lbs. avoirdupois. 
 
THE SYSTEMS OF EGYPT, BABYLON, AND PALESTINE. 265 
 
 Such scientific adjustments take place in all countries with the 
 advance of civilization and commerce, and above all under the 
 influence of a strong central government. Let us reflect how 
 long it has taken for the English Statute Acre to conquer 
 the local ancient acres in use in various parts of the United 
 Kingdom, such as the Irish, the Scotch or the Winchester 
 acre. In like fashion, although the standards of weight and 
 capacity were regulated by Act of Parliament in 1824, local 
 usage still held on, and units of weight unknown to the Statute 
 still survive in the usage of provincial places. Now it is not 
 unreasonable to suppose that the name royal or king's weight 
 was given to the Babylonian commercial system, which was 
 constructed on purely sexagesimal lines, because it was enforced 
 by royal proclamation and power throughout the whole of the 
 empire, and that in like manner the royal cubit mentioned by 
 Herodotus (i. 178) owes its origin to the establishment of one 
 uniform standard for the dominions of the Great King. In fact 
 no better illustration of what took place can be found than 
 that afforded by our own terms such as imperial pint, or tm- 
 perial gallon, or in a less degree by the statute acre, as con- 
 trasted with the older customary pints, or gallons, or acres. 
 The mistake made by metrologists, in regarding the scientifi- 
 cally constructed Babylonian system as the first beginning of the 
 art of weighing, is just as great as if a person writing a manual 
 of English Metrology were to start with the metric legislation 
 of 182'i as the first beginning of our metrology, and were to 
 try and explain all traces of an earlier system or systems by 
 forcing the facts into some sort of conformity with our modern 
 standards. Undoubtedly in such an effort great facility would 
 be found inasmuch as the present scientific standards are simply 
 the ancient units of the realm accurately defined. But the 
 reader will best understand the relations which probably ex- 
 isted between the Babylonian royal standard (both single and 
 double) by having a short account of the adjustment of our 
 standards laid before him. Great inconvenience having been 
 felt in the United Kingdom for a long time from the want of 
 uniformity in the system of weights and measures, which were 
 in use in different parts of it, an Act of Parliament was passed 
 
266 THE SYSTEMS OF EGYPT, BABYLON, AND PALESTINE. 
 
 in 1824 and came into force on January the 1st 1826, by which 
 certain measures and weights therein specified were declared 
 to be the only lawful ones in this realm under the name of 
 imperial weights and measures. It was settled by this Act 
 (1) that a certain yard-measure, made by an order of Parliament 
 in 1760 by a comparison of the yards then in common use, 
 should henceforward be the iinperial yard and the standard of 
 le^igth for the kingdom : and that, in case this standard should 
 be lost or injured, it might be recovered from a knowledge 
 of the fact that the length of a pendulum, oscillating in a 
 second in vacuo in the latitude t>f London and at the level of 
 the sea (which can always be accurately obtained by certain 
 scientific processes), was 3913929 inches of this yard : (2) that 
 the half of a double pound Troy, made at the same time (1760), 
 should be the Imperial Pound Troy and the siaxiAtwd oi weiglit ; 
 and that of the 5760 grains which this pound contains, the 
 pound Avoirdupois should contain 7000 ; and that, in case this 
 standard should be lost or injured, it might be recovei'ed from 
 the knowledge of the fact that a cubic inch of distilled water 
 at the temperature of 62" Fahrenheit, and when the barometer 
 is at 30 in., weighs 252'4.58 grains: (3) that the iinperial gidloii 
 and standard of capacity should contain 277'274 cvhic inches 
 (the inch being above defined), which size was selected from its 
 being nearly that of the gallons already in use, and from the 
 fact that 10 lbs. Avoirdupois of distilled water weighed in air 
 at a temperature of 62° Fahrenheit, and when the barometc^r 
 stands at 30 in., will just fill this space. On p. 180 we saw that 
 the standard gallon in the Tudor period ultimately depended 
 on the pennyweight, which was, as we found, fixed by being the 
 weight of 32 grains of wheat, dry and taken from the midst 
 of the ear of wheat after the ancient laws of the realm. It was 
 from the descendants of this gallon that the imperial gallon 
 of 1824 was fixed, with a slight modification so as to make 
 it contain 10 lbs. of distilled water weighed in air at a tempe- 
 rature of 62° and when the barometer stands at 30 in. The 
 double pound Troy made in 1760 depended in like fashion for 
 its ultimate origin (jii the wheat-grains, and it also affords us 
 an interesting illuwtration of the doubling of the (niginal single 
 
THE SYSTEMS OF EGYPT, BABYLON, AND PALESTINE. 267 
 
 unit, such as we find in the heavy royal Babylonian system. 
 We may find further analogies between our own system and 
 that of the Babylonians. Whilst at the Mint gold and silver 
 are weighed for coinage by Troy weight, the copper coinage on 
 the other hand is regulated by the lb. Avoirdupois, the ordinary 
 commercial standard. As already remarked, it is almost certain 
 from the method of elimination that copper was the principal 
 article for which the royal Babylonian system was employed, 
 as gold and silver had separate standards of their own, and 
 corn was sold by measure and not by weight. 
 
 To sum up then the results of our enquiry into the 
 Assyrio-Babylonian system, we started with the so-called light 
 shekel or ox-unit as the basis of the system; and found that 
 gold and silver were weighed by it and by its fifty-fold, 
 the maneh, which may have been itself a natural measure of 
 capacity, such as the catty used in Eastern Asia, where we 
 know for certain that this weight was originally a measure of, 
 capacity obtained from the joints of bamboos or the cocoa- 
 nut ; that in a certain part of the empire a need was felt 
 for a slightly heavier unit for the weighing of silver and 
 precious commodities such as gums and spices, and that ac- 
 cordingly the great trading Aramaic peoples used the two-fold 
 of the ox-unit (260 grains Troy); that at the earliest period 
 copper would not be sold by weight but would be sold by bars 
 or plates of fixed dimensions, as is still the practice with ii-on 
 and copper among the barbarous peoples of Further Asia and 
 Africa ; that with the advance of culture the art of weighing 
 was extended to copper and other articles of small value in 
 proportion to their bulk, and that, as the maneh, or contents of 
 a gourd, and the load or amount that a man could carry on his 
 back, had been most probably in general use as units for common 
 merchandise, the time came when under the all-mastering au- 
 thority of the Great King a standard based on the ancient ox- 
 unit, but framed on the new scientific sexagesimal system, was 
 established for copper and certain other kinds of merchandise ; 
 that in this system 60 shekels made the maneh, and the load 
 (the kikkar or talent) was adjusted to the new system as the 
 sixty-fold of the maneh; and that in the course of time this 
 
268 THE SYSTEMS OF EGYPT, BABYLON, AND PALESTINE. 
 
 higher unit of the kikkar or talent was added to the gold and 
 silver systems, sixty manehs in each case making the kikkar 
 as in the case of the royal or commercial system ; that in the 
 case of silver, which on its first discovery and employment was 
 as valuable as gold, and was therefore weighed on the same 
 standard, when in course of time it became about thirteen 
 times less valuable than gold, and there was a difficulty ex- 
 perienced ia exchangiag the units of gold and silver, a separate 
 standard was created by dividing into ten new parts or shekels 
 the amount of silver which was the equivalent of the gold 
 shekel (ox-unit); that this was probably developed before the 
 royal commercial mina of 60 shekels had been formed, as in 
 that case the silver mina would have contained 60 shekels 
 likewise ; we were able to give an explanation of the name 
 royal as applied to the commercial standard by regarding it 
 as of late origin, created by a supreme central authority for 
 the regulation of the commerce of a great empire made up 
 of a heterogeneous mass of races, just as in the present century 
 our own imperial standards have been fixed for the whole king- 
 dom, being based, as was the Babylonian, on an ancient unit 
 empirically obtained; and just as the royal arms are stamped 
 on our imperial standards, so the weights of the Assyrian royal 
 system were shaped in the form of a lion, the symbol of royalty 
 throughout the East. Finally we found that at the base of the 
 Assyrio-Babylonian system lay, as the determiaant of the ox- 
 unit or shekel, the grain of wheat, which we have already traced 
 all across Europe into Asia. We can therefore now come to a 
 very reasonable conclusion that the Assyrio-Babylonian weight 
 system was in its origin empirical, and that it was only at a 
 comparatively late date in its history, just as in the case of our 
 own standards, that a certain uniformity between the standards 
 of measures and weights was brought about by the (not com- 
 plete) application of the sexagesimal system of numeration, the 
 invention of which is their eternal glory. 
 
 Having now dealt with Egypt, and the systems which 
 prevailed in the Assyrio-Babylonian empire, it will be best to 
 treat of the region which lay between them. In both the 
 former countries we found the light shekel or ox-unit in use 
 
THE SYSTEMS OF EGYPT, BABYLON, AND PALESTINE. 269 
 
 from the earliest times; and it will also be remembered that 
 at an eai-lier stage we found that Abraham was able to traverse 
 all the wide covmtry that lay between Mesopotamia and the 
 ancient kingdom of the Nile with his flocks and herds, and 
 that he dwelt in the land of Canaan in close neighbourhood 
 and on friendly terms with the sons of Heth, or Hittites, who 
 were then the possessors of that land ; and that furthermore 
 monetary transactions were then carried on by means of certain 
 small ingots of silver, as we see from the purchase of the Cave 
 of Machpelah. These ingots, translated shekels in the English 
 version and called didrachms in the Septuagint, are termed in 
 Hebrew Keseph (C|D3), sixa-ply pieces of silver, or silverlings. In 
 
 the old Hebrew literature values in silver and gold are expressed 
 either in shekels or by a simple numeral with the words "of silver," 
 "of gold" added (where the latter method is followed the English 
 version supplies pieces or substitutes "a thousand silverlings" 
 for " a thousand of silver" (Isa. vii. 23). The Septuagint renders 
 the skekel by the Greek didrachiii). There are several inferences 
 to be drawn from this. It is evident that pieces of silver (and 
 no doubt of gold also) of a certain quality and weight were 
 employed as currency in Palestine, and we may likewise suppose 
 with some probability that these pieces of silver were according 
 to the standard in common use in Egypt and Chaldaea. Again, 
 since we have ah-eady shown that gold in the form of rings and 
 other ai'ticles for personal adornment was exchanged according 
 to the ox-unit of 130-5 grs., as evidenced by the story of the 
 ring given to Rebekah, it follows that there was but one and the 
 same standard for gold from the Euphrates to the Nile. This 
 is confirmed by the story of the sale of Joseph by his brethren 
 to the company of Ishmaelites "who came from Gilead with 
 their camels bearing spices and balm and myn-h going to carry 
 it do^vn to Egypt " : to these Ishmaelites or Midianites Joseph 
 was sold for twenty pieces of silver'. Here we have evidence 
 that the same silver unit was current from Gilead to Egypt. 
 There are various other large sums of silver mentioned both 
 in Genesis and also in the Book of Judges and in Joshua. 
 Thus Abimelech, King of Gerar, is said to have given Abraham 
 
 ' For "20 pieces of gold (eficofft XP""''"'') LXX. 
 
270 THE SYSTEMS OF EGYPT, BABYLON, AND PALESTINE. 
 
 a thousand [pieces] of silver', whilst the lords of the Philis- 
 tines persuaded Delilah to beguile Samson into telling her 
 wherein laly his great strength by the promise of eleven 
 hundred [pieces] of silver, which money she afterwards received'. 
 Abimelech the son of Jerubbaal (Gideon) was enabled to form 
 hLs conspiracy by hiring 'vain and light persons" with the 
 three-score and ten [pieces] of silver taken by his mother's 
 brother from the house of Baal-berith. Finally, we have a sum 
 of eleven hundred [pieces] of silver which were stolen by that 
 "man of Mount Ephraim whose name was Micah" from his 
 mother, of which his mother took (when he had restored the 
 money) two hundred [shekels] and gave them to the founder, 
 who " made thereof a graven image and a molten image*." Now 
 although all these are considerable sums, all exceeding a mina, 
 yet there is no mention whatever made of the latter unit of 
 account in any of these passages. The story of another theft 
 shows that gold as well as silver was reckoned originally only 
 by the shekel and not by the mina. Thus Achan •' saw among 
 the spoils a goodly Babylonish garment and two hundred shekels 
 of silver and a wedge of gold of fifty shekels weight'." As fifty 
 shekels were a mina, here if anywhere we ought to have found 
 the latter term. From this we infer without hesitation that 
 the shekel was the original unit. 
 
 But there is another word besides heseph which is translated 
 piece of moneij or piece of silver. This is the term qesitah 
 /ntO^B'p) which occurs in three passages of the Old Testament. 
 
 Thus Jacob bought the parcel of ground where he had spread 
 his tent at the hand of the children of Hamor, Shechem's 
 father, " for an hundred pieces of money " (Gen. xxxiii. 19) ; and 
 the same word is used in the parallel passage in Joshua 
 (xxiv. 82) where the childi-en of Israel buried Joseph's bones 
 in Shechem in the parcel of ground which Jacob bought for an 
 hundred pieces of money. Lastly, Job's kinsfolk and acquain- 
 tances gave him every man a piece of vioney, and every one a 
 ring of gold (xlii. 11). It has been always a matter of doubt 
 what this piece of money really was. The Septuagint translates 
 
 1 Gen. XX. 16. ' .Judgts xvi. 5. ' Jndges ix. 4. 
 
 ^ .Judges xvii. '1 — 4. ' Joshua vii. 21. 
 
THE STSTEiLS OF EGYPT, BABTLOX, AND PALESTiyE. 271 
 
 qesitah in these three passages by exarbv afivwv, eKarov afivdSmv, 
 and a/ivdBa fjilav, thus in every case reg;arding it as a lamh. 
 The most ancient interpreters all agree in this, whilst some of 
 the later Rabbis regarded it as signifying a coin stamped with 
 the form of a lamb : one of them says that he found such a coin 
 in Africa*. 
 
 Long ago Prof R S. Poole, speaking of this word, said: 
 " The sanction of the LXX, and the use of weights bearing the 
 forms of lions, bulls, and geese by the Egyptians, Assyrians, and 
 probably Persians, must make us hesitate before we abandon 
 a rendering [lamb] so singularlj- confirmed by the relation 
 of the Latin pecunia and pecusV The connection between 
 
 A. B. 
 
 Fig. 25. Weights in the form of Sheep^. 
 
 weights and xmits of currency is especially close at a time 
 when coined money is as yet unknown, and hence when we 
 find weights in the form of sheep coming from Syria, and 
 also recollect that sheep were employed as a regular unit in 
 Palestine for the paying of tribute, and with the light obtained 
 from primitive systems of cunency, we may well conclude that 
 the qesitah was an old imit of barter, like the Homeric ox, and 
 
 • Cf. Bnxtorf and Gesenius «u6 voce. 
 
 2 Madden's JewUh Coinage, p. 7. 
 
 ^ A is from Beirut, in the Greville Chester Collection in the Ashmolean 
 Mnseom, of white and yellow crystalline stone ; wt. 32-160 gram, (a very slight 
 chip from the base) ; on the base is engraved a mde ibex and another figure. B 
 is from Persia, slightly chipped on side of head, yellowish white stone, veined with 
 red, like jasper ; wt. 22-450 gram. : on the base are two ibexes. I am indebted 
 for this information to Mr A. J. Evans, Keeper of the Ashmolean Mnsenm, by 
 whose kindness I am likewise enabled to give representations of the weights. 
 
272 THE SYSTEMS OF EGYPT, BABYLON, AND PALESTINE. 
 
 as the latter was transformed into a gold unit, so the former 
 was superseded by an equivalent of silver. We read (2 Kings 
 iii. 4) that Mesha, king of Moab (now so famous fi-om the 
 inscription which bears his name), was a sheep-master, and he 
 rendered unto the king of Israel one hundred thousand lambs, 
 and one hundred thousand rams with the wool. When payment 
 in metal came more and more into use silver served as the 
 sub-multiple of gold, just as sheep formed that of the ox, and 
 it is not surprising that in later times when coins were struck 
 
 Fig. 26. Coin of Salamis in Cyprus. 
 
 by the Phoenicians, as at Salamis ia Cjrprus and many other 
 places, bearing a sheep or a sheep's head, there arose some 
 doubt as to whether the qesitah was a sheep, a piece of uncoined 
 silver, or a coin stamped with a sheep. The very fact of the 
 Phoenicians having such a predilection for this type is in itself 
 an indication that the silver coin in its origin represented the 
 value of a sheep. At a later stage, when we come to deal with 
 the early Greek coin types, we shall develope this principle 
 more completely. The mere fact that the sheep on the 
 Phoenician coins is sometimes found accompanying a divinity 
 does not militate against our doctrine, as I shall explain when 
 I deal with the coins of Messana and Thasos. 
 
 But then comes the question, which was the shekel employed 
 by the Hebrews ? It must have been either (1) the ox-unit of 
 130 grs., used alike for gold and silver in early days both in 
 Egypt and Mesopotamia and Greece, or (2) the double of this, 
 or heavy shekel of 260 grs., used for gold only in parts of 
 Asia Minor, or (3) the Phoenician shekel of 225 grs., used only 
 for silver and electrum along the coast of Asia Minor, and never 
 employed for gold, or (4) the Babylonian or Persic standard of 
 172 grs., used only for silver. In later times the silver shekel in 
 
THE SYSTEMS OF EGYPT, BABYLON, AND PALESTINE. 273 
 
 use amongst the Jews was most undoubtedly the Phoenician 
 shekel, obtained, as we saw above, by dividing the amount of 
 silver equivalent to the double gold shekel into 15 parts. But 
 it may be reasonably doubted whether the silver piece or shekel 
 (called always a didrachmon in the Septuagint) mentioned in 
 Genesis and Judges is the Phoenician shekel. It is used with- 
 out any distinctive epithet, as if it were the weight par 
 excellence, and is employed for gold as well as silver. But 
 when we turn to certain other passages we find mention made 
 of a shekel called the Shekel of the Sanctuary'^. This shekel is 
 frequently mentioned, generally in connection with silver, and 
 in reference to such things as the contribution of the half- 
 shekel to the Tabernacle, the redemption of the firstborn, the 
 sacrifice of animals, and the payment of the seer. Yet we find 
 this shekel likewise employed in the estimation of gold, a 
 fact which at once shews that it is neither the Phoenician 
 shekel of 220 grs. nor the Persic of 172 grs., both of which were 
 confined to silver: It must then have been either the ox-unit 
 of 130 grs. or the heavy shekel of 260 grs. As the latter was 
 confined in use to gold it follows that the ox-unit of 130 grs. 
 alone fits the conditions required. If then we can discover 
 what in the case of either silver or gold was the weight of this 
 shekel, we shall have determined it for both metals, for it will 
 hardly be maintained that there was one shekel of the Sanctuary 
 for gold and one of different weight for silver. 
 
 Now we read in Exodus (xxxviii. 24 seqq.) that "all the 
 gold that was occupied for the work in all the work of the holy 
 [place], even the gold of the offering, was twenty and nine 
 talents and seven hundred and thirty shekels, after the shekel 
 of the Sanctuary. And the silver of them that were numbered 
 of the congregation was an hundred talents and a thousand 
 seven hundred and three-score and fifteen shekels, after the 
 shekel of the Sanctuary ; a bekah for every man, that is, half a 
 shekel after the shekel of the Sanctuary, for every one that 
 went to be numbered from twenty years old and upward, for 
 six hundred thousand and three thousand and five hundred 
 and fifty men. And the brass of the offering was seventy 
 ' PIxod. XXX. 13. Levit. v. 15, etc. 
 
 B. 18 
 
274 THE SYSTEMS OF EGYPT, BABYLON, AND PALESTINE. 
 
 talents and two thousand and four hundred shekels." From 
 this passage we learn that, whilst the gold and silver were 
 estimated on the shekel of the Sanctuary (or Holy Shekel), 
 the brass was probably reckoned by some other standard. 
 
 It is also of importance to note that it is the shekel which 
 is regarded as the unit of the system, for we never hear of a 
 talent or mina of the Sanctuary. From this passage likewise 
 we readily discover that the talent of silver contained 3000 
 shekels (603,550 ^ 2 = 301,775 shekels - 1775 = 300,000 ^ 100 
 = 3000 shekels). 
 
 Now when king Solomon made three hundred shields of 
 beaten gold, three minas (translated pounds in the Authorized 
 Version) went to one shield (1 Kings x. 17). But in the 
 parallel passage (1 Chron. ix. 1) we read that " three hundred 
 shields made he of beaten gold, three hundred shekels went to 
 one shield," from which it is evident that a maneh of gold 
 contained 100 shekels\ A very important conclusion follows 
 from these facts, for it is plain that when the Hebrews adopted 
 the heavy or double maneh from the Phoenicians they did not 
 adopt for gold and silver at the same time the double shekel, of 
 which that maneh was the fifty-fold, but on the contrary they 
 retained their own old unit of the light shekel, and made 
 one hundred of them equivalent to the Phoenician or heavy 
 Assyrian mina. Since this light shekel was employed in the 
 estimation of the gold and silver dedicated by King Solomon 
 for the adornment of the Temple, this shekel can hardly be 
 any other than the Holy Shekel of the Sanctuary. 
 
 We are thus led to conclude that the shekel was the same 
 both for gold and silver, and was simply the time-honoured 
 immemorial unit of 130 — 5 grs. 
 
 It is natural on other grounds that this should be the unit 
 employed by the Israelites for the precious metals, since it was 
 the unit employed both for silver and gold in Egypt, the land 
 of their bondage. 
 
 1 The question of the date at which certain documents were written or took 
 their final shape is of course important. But it does not at all follow that a 
 document written at a later period cannot contain traditions of real historical 
 value. Thus here we find Chronicles, placed quite late by the critics, gives the 
 weight in shekels, whilst Kings, supposed to be far earlier, gives it in minas. 
 
THE SYSTEMS OF EGYPT, BABYLON, AND PALESTINE. 275 
 
 The question next suggests itself. Why was the shekel ca/lled 
 by a distinctive name ? It is only when there are two or more 
 examples or individuals of the same kind that any need arises 
 for a distinctive appellation : again, as we have already observed, 
 in such cases the older institution continues to prevail in all 
 matters religious or legal. It is important to note that in 
 Exodus xxi. 32, a passage which the best critics consider of 
 great antiquity, the penalties are expressed in shekels simply 
 without any distinctive appellation. At that period there was 
 probably only one shekel (the ox-unit of 130 — 5 grs.) as yet 
 in use, and so there was no need to distinguish the shekel 
 in which fines were paid. This shekel was then described in 
 the later part of Exodus, where there was a second standard 
 in use, as the holy shekel. As a matter of fact we have 
 another weight mentioned in 2 Samuel (xiv. 26), where it is 
 related of Absalom that " when he polled his head (for it was at 
 every year's end that he polled it : because the hair was heavy 
 on him, therefore he polled it) he weighed the hair of his head 
 at two hundred shekels after the king's weights" 
 
 Now it will be observed that in the passage from Exodus 
 quoted above, whilst the shekel of the Sanctuary is care- 
 fully mentioned when amounts of gold and silver are enumerated, 
 no such addition is made in reference to the " seventy talents 
 and two thousand and four hundred shekels of brass." If then 
 the heavy or double shekel and its corresponding mina and 
 talent, known to us hitherto as the royal Assyrio-Babylonian 
 heavy standard, had already been introduced among the 
 Hebrews (and we have just seen that according to the First 
 Book of Kings it was in use, at least a mina of 50 double 
 shekels (100 light) was employed for gold), nothing is more 
 likely than that this standard would bear a title similar to that 
 which it enjoyed in Babylonia and Syria, and be known as the 
 king's weight or stone. As I have observed in the case of 
 
 1 The mere question as to whether the 200 shekels is far more than the 
 average crop of hair can weigh, does not concern us. If the writer wished to 
 exaggerate the amount of Absalom's hair he would naturally make the shekel 
 as heavy as possible, and say that the weight was in the heavy or royal shekels, 
 employed for merchandize. 
 
 18—2 
 
276 THE SYSTEMS OF EGYPT, BABYLON, AND PALESTINE. 
 
 the royal Assyrian standards that they were employed for 
 copper, lead, and commodities sufficiently costly to be sold by 
 weight, so we may with considerable probability conjecture that 
 this king's weight was employed regularly among the Semites 
 for the weighing of the less precious metals, and other merchan- 
 dise. Hence it is that there was no need to add any explanation 
 of the nature of the standard by which the 70 talents of 
 brass were weighed, and it was only because in the case of 
 Absalom's hair we have an article not commonly weighed, that 
 it was thought necessary by the writer to make clear to us by 
 which of the two standards usually employed the estimate of 
 the weight of the year's growth of hair was made. We may 
 therefore conclude with probability that "the king's shekel" 
 was no other than the double shekel (260 grains). It will 
 have been noted that in Genesis and Judges, admittedly two 
 of the oldest books, there is mention made of only one kind of 
 shekel, and that it is only in Exodus, Numbers and Leviticus, 
 all of late date, that we find the shekel distinguished as that of 
 the Sanctuary, and that it is only in Samuel that we find refer- 
 ence made to the royal shekel. It is also worthy of notice that 
 neither in Genesis nor Judges is there any mention made of a 
 maneh or talent, although there was full opportunity for the 
 appearance of the former if it had been then in use, as we find 
 such sums as 400 shekels (4 manehs), 1100 shekels (11 manehs) 
 and 1700 shekels (17 manehs), whilst in the other series of 
 books named we find both the maneh and the talent. It is not 
 unreasonable therefore to suppose, that with the advent of the 
 maneh and kikkar or talent from their powerful kinsfolk and 
 neighbours came also the practice of employing the double 
 shekel, the fiftieth part of the mina of gold and mina of silver, 
 which was employed in that part of the Assyrio-Babylonian 
 empire, where the use of the heavy Assyrian shekel was in 
 vogue. Besides gold and silver, spices were likewise weighed 
 according to the shekel of the Sanctuary. " Take thee also 
 unto thee principal spices, of pure myrrh five hundred [shekels], 
 and of sweet cinnamon half as much [even] two hundred and 
 fifty [shekels], and of sweet calamus two hundred and fifty 
 [shekels], and of cassia five hundred [shekels], after the shekel 
 
THE SYSTEMS OF EGYPT, BABYLON, AND PALESTINE. 277 
 
 of the Sanctuary'." If we had any doubt as to whether it was 
 not possible that there were two separate shekels of the Sanc- 
 tuary, one for gold, and one of different standard foi- silver, our 
 misgivings are at once dispelled by finding spices weighed after 
 the holy shekel. It is certainly incredible that there could 
 have been a separate standard of the Sanctuary for the weighing 
 of spices. There seems then no reasonable doubt that there was 
 only one shekel of the Sanctuary, and that the unit of 130 
 grains. In support of this we may adduce Josephus", who 
 made the Jewish gold shekel a Daric (which as we have already 
 seen is our unit of 130 grains). This in turn derives support 
 from the fact that the Septuagint, which regularly renders the 
 Hebrew sheqel (which like the Greek Talanton means simply 
 weight) by both siklos and didrachmon, not unfrequently renders 
 shekel of gold by chrysfts^ which means of course nothing 
 more than gold stater, that is a didrachm of gold, such as those 
 struck by the Athenians, by Philip of Macedon, Alexander and 
 the successors of the latter, including the Ptolemies of Egypt, 
 under whom was made the Septuagint Version. We have thus 
 found the earliest Hebrew weight unit to be that standard 
 which we have found universally diffused, and which we have 
 called the ox-unit. 
 
 Next let us see how from this unit grew their system. In 
 several passages the shekel of the Sanctuary is said to consist 
 of 20 gerahs*, a word rendered simply by obolos in the Septuagint. 
 As before observed, the Hebrew metric system was essentially 
 decimal, like that of Egypt ; in fact had Tacitus been a metro- 
 logist he might have quoted this as an additional proof that the 
 Jews were Egyptian outcasts, expelled by their countrymen 
 because they were afflicted with a plague, perhaps the scabies^, 
 which so frequently affects swine. The measures of capacity, 
 both dry and liquid, are decimal, and so accordingly we find 
 a decimal division applied to the shekel. The latter is divided 
 into two bekahs (yp3, "a division," " a half"), and each bekah is 
 
 1 Exod. XXX. 23—4. ^ Antiq. in. 8, 10. 
 
 3 Pollux, IX. 59, observes that when xpwoi's stands alone, (rrar-fip Is always to 
 be understood. 
 
 ' Exod. XXX. 13. •' Hist. v. 3. 
 
278 THE SYSTEMS OF EGYPT, BABYLON, AND PALESTINE. 
 
 divided into 10 gerahs (ma). The latter siguifies " a grain" or 
 "bean." The Hebrew literature does not state what kind of seed 
 or grain it was, although it is defined by Rabbinical writers as 
 equal to 16 barleycorns. But the fact is that, as we see from the 
 Septuagint rendering, the name in the course of time came to 
 be considered simply as that of one-twentieth of the shekel, 
 whether that shekel was the shekel of the Sanctuary, the 
 Phoenician silver shekel of 220 grains, or the king's shekel of 
 260 grains used for copper and lead. The gerah of the gold 
 shekel or shekel of the Sanctuary was probably the most ancient 
 and came closest to the natural seed from which it derived its 
 name ; this gerah would be about 6^ grains (130 -^ 20 = 6'5). 
 On an earlier page (p. 194) we gave the weights of a number of 
 grains and seeds of plants, and amongst them that of the lupin, 
 called by the Greeks thermos. According to the ancient tables 
 the thermos is equal to two keratia, or siliquae (the seeds of the 
 carob tree); but since each siliqua — 4 wheat grains, the thermos = 
 8 wheat grains, or 6 barleycorns, or 6 Troy grains. If the wheat 
 grain in Palestine was as heavy as that of Egypt or Africa 
 ('051 gram, instead of "047 gram.), the 8 wheat grains, would 
 = 6'4 grains troy. Again, the Roman metrologists estimated 
 the lupin as the third part of the scripulum, which weighed 24 
 grains of wheat ^ ; thus the Roman lupin also = 8 wheat grains. 
 We may therefore have little doubt that the gerah was simply 
 the lupin". But what about the Rabbinical gerah of 16 barley- 
 corns ? In the first place let us recall the confusion which 
 exists in the Arab metrologists respecting the habba, some 
 making three habbas, some four equal to the karat. This arose, 
 as we saw, from confounding the wheat and barley gi-ain. If 
 the 16 grains assigned to the gerah by the Rabbis are really 
 wheat grains, all is at once clear. The gerah to which they 
 refer is that of the royal or double shekel (260 grs.), or in other 
 words it is a double gerah. We have just found the gerah of 
 the Sanctuary shekel to be the lupin, and equal to 8 wheat 
 grains, accordingly its double will contain 16 wheat grains. 
 
 ' Hultsch, Metr. Scrip. «. v. Lupinus. 
 
 ' In Gesenius' Lexicon, ii. 88 ; ii. 144, it is suggested that the gerah is the 
 lupin. 
 
THE SYSTEMS OF EGYPT, BABYLON, AND PALESTINE. 279 
 
 Nothing is more common than a change in the value of a 
 natural weight unit, when in the course of time its real origin 
 has been forgotten, and it has been adjusted to meet the re- 
 quirements of newer systems. Thus the value of the Greek 
 thermos ajid its Roman equivalent the Iwpin both suffered 
 in later days, and were regarded as only equal to 6 wheat 
 grains instead of the original 8 owing to a like confusion 
 between wheat grains and barleycorns. Finally there is a 
 further reason why the authors of the Septuagint Version would 
 translate gerah by obolos. Writing at Alexandria under 
 Ptolemaic rule, at a time when the Ptolemaic silver stater 
 of 220 grains contained exactly 20 obols of the Attic or or- 
 dinary Greek standard of 11 grains, they would all the more 
 readily adopt a rendering, which harmonized so well with the 
 monetary system of their own day ; at the same time the Greek 
 habit of dividing all staters into 12 obols, no matter on what 
 standard the stater was struck, naturally would incline them all 
 the more to regard the gerah not as an actual weight, but simply 
 as the twentieth of the shekel, be the shekel what it might. 
 
 The Hebrew gold standard accordingly consisted of a shekel 
 of 130 grains, subdivided into 2 bekahs or halves ; each of which 
 in turn contained 10 gerahs or lupins : 100 such shekels made 
 a maneh, and according to Josephus' 100 manehs made a kikkar 
 or talent. It would thus appear that, just as in the time of 
 Solomon the heavy mina had been introduced which was equal 
 to 100 shekels of the Sanctuary, so the Hebrews carried out 
 consistently this principle by making 100 minae go to the 
 talent. It is however most probable that before that time they 
 had employed a maneh of their own of 50 light shekels, for we 
 have seen above that the talent of silver mentioned in Exodus 
 consisted of only 3000 shekels, just as in all the other gold and 
 silver systems of Asia Minor and Greece : and since we have 
 proved that the silver shekel of the Sanctuary was the ordinary 
 light shekel of 130 grains, it is evident that the silver talent is 
 not made up of 3000 double shekels, but is really nothing more 
 
 1 Antiq. iil. 6, § 7, Xvxvla ^k xpvaov . . .arad fibv ^x"""'* M''2s cKariv, os'B^paioi 
 T^XavTov, 
 
280 THE SYSTEMS OF EGYPT, BA35YLON, AND PALESTINE. 
 
 than the sixty-fold of a mina which contained 50 shekels of the 
 ox- unit standard. If gold was weighed at all by any higher 
 standard than the shekel, it is almost certain that it must have 
 been weighed by this mina and talents However, by the time 
 of the monarchy it is most probable that the double or heavy 
 mina had been introduced for silver as well as for gold. In fact 
 the probabilities are that it was applied for the weighing of 
 silver before that of gold. Thus when Naaman the leper set 
 out to go to the Hebrew prophet, "he took with him ten 
 talents of silver, and six thousand [pieces] of gold, and ten 
 changes of raimentl" Here the 6000 gold pieces are perhaps 
 the 6000 light shekels which would make a talent of the 
 heavy Assyrian standard after the ordinary Phoenician system 
 of 50 shekels = 1 mina, and 60 minae = 1 talent: and doubtless 
 Naaman counted these 6000 gold pieces as a talent of gold ; but 
 inasmuch as the Hebrews had a peculiar system of their own, by 
 which 100 minae, and 10,000 light shekels went to the kikkar, 
 these 6000 are not described as a talent by the Hebrew writer. 
 We may thus regard the silver talent as consisting of 3000 light 
 shekels, at the earliest period, and later on as of 3000 heavy 
 shekels: finally, when coinage was introduced and money was 
 struck under the Maccabees on the Phoenician silver standard, 
 it consisted of 3000 shekels of 220 grs. each. But there is one 
 period about which we find great difficulty in coming to any 
 conclusion. After the return from the Babylonian captivity 
 what standards were employed for gold and silver ? As Judaea 
 formed part of the dominions of the Great King, we would 
 naturally expect to find in Nehemiah and Ezra traces of the 
 standard then employed throughout the Persian Empire for 
 the precious metals. As we have found that the light shekel 
 formed the unit for gold from first to last, and as it was also the 
 gold unit of the Babylonians and Assyrians, we may unhesi- 
 
 1 Even granting that the parts of Exodus (the priestly Code) took their 
 present form in post-Exile times it is perfectly possible that the metrological 
 data contained therein are based on a genuine old tradition, just as Homer, 
 although in its present shape differing much in linguistic forms from what 
 must have been its original, gives us an archaic talent quite different from those 
 in use when it took its final shape. 
 
 ^ 2 Kings V. 5. 
 
THE SYSTEMS OF EGYPT, BABYLON, AND PALESTINE. 281 
 
 tatingly assvime that it formed the basis of the Jewish system 
 in the days of Nehemiah (446 B.C.). As regards the silver 
 standard we have fortunately one piece of evidence, which may 
 give us the right solution. We found that in Exodus each 
 male Israelite contributed a hekah, or half a shekel (of the 
 Sanctuary) to defray the cost of the tabernacle : this half-shekel 
 was a drachm of about 65 grs. Troy. Now after the Return 
 from Captivity, we find Nehemiah (x. 32) writing : " We made 
 ordinances for vis, to charge ourselves yearly with the third part 
 of a shekel' for the service of the house of our God." Why the 
 third of a shekel instead of the half of earlier days ? When we 
 read of the generous and self-sacrificing efforts made by the 
 Jews to restore the ancient glories of the Temple worship, we 
 can hardly believe that it was through any desire to reduce the 
 annual contribution. The solution is not far to seek when we 
 recollect that the Babylonian silver stater of that age weighed 
 about 172'8 grs. This formed the standard of the empire, and 
 doubtless the Jews of the Captivity employed it like the rest 
 of the subjects of the Great King. The third part of this stater 
 or shekel weighed about 58 grains ; so that practically the third 
 part of the Babylonian silver shekel was the same as the half of 
 the ancient light shekel, or shekel of the Sanctuary. From this 
 we may not unreasonably infer that after the Return the Jews 
 employed the Babylonian silver shekel as their silver unit, and 
 this probably continued in use until Alexander by the victories 
 of Issus and Arbela overthrew the Persian Empire, and erected 
 his own on its ruins. But although the Babylonian shekel was 
 the official standard of the empire there can be no doubt that 
 the old local standards lingered on, or rather held their ground 
 stubbornly in not a few cases. We saw above that the 
 Aramaean peoples had especially preferred the double shekel, 
 and from it they developed the so-called Phoenician or Graeco- 
 Asiatic silver standard. Gold being to silver as 13'3 : 1, one 
 double shekel of 260 grains of gold was equal to fifteen reduced 
 double shekels of silver of 225 grains each. Now it is im- 
 portant to note that the Phoenician shekel or stater was always 
 considered not as a didrachm but as a tetradrachm ; a fact which 
 
 ^ LXX. Tpirov Tov didptixfiov. 
 
282 THE SYSTEMS OF EGYPT, BABYLON, AND PALESTINE. 
 
 is explained by its development from the old double shekel, 
 which of course was regarded as containing four drachms, and 
 which at the same time explains why it is that in the New 
 Testament the Temple-tax of the half shekel is called a 6,i- 
 drachm, the term applied to the shekel itself in the Septuagint. 
 When the Jews coined money under the Maccabees, they struck 
 their silver coins on this Phoenician standard, and their shekel 
 was always regarded as a tetradrachm. For the ancient half 
 shekel of the Sanctuary they soon substituted the half of their 
 shekel coins, that is about 110 instead of 66 grains of silver. 
 This change probably took place under the Maccabees ; silver 
 had then probably become much more plentiful in Judaea as 
 shown by the fact that they were able to issue a silver coinage. 
 When those who collected the Temple-tax asked Christ for his 
 didrachm, he bade Simon Peter go to the sea and catch a fish, 
 in the mouth of which he would find a stater, " that give him, 
 said he, for both me and thee." As the stater evidently 
 sufficed to pay a didrachm for each, there can be no doubt that 
 the shekel or stater was considered by the Jews to be a tetra- 
 drachm. 
 
 It is very uncertain whether the Hebrews at any time 
 employed a maneh of 60 shekels. They most certainly did not 
 do so for gold and silver, and probablj' not even for copper 
 and other cheap commodities. Very unfortunately the famous 
 passage in Ezekiel (xlv. 12), which deals with weights and 
 measures, is so confused in the description of the maneh that we 
 cannot employ it as evidence. The one element of certainty is 
 that the gold shekel never varied from first to last. It is like- 
 wise probable that, whilst the heavy maneh was introduced for 
 gold silver and copper alike, the shekel always remained the 
 same, 100 shekels being counted to the mina of gold and silver 
 in the royal system, whilst 50 shekels always continued to be 
 regarded as composing the maneh of the Sanctuary, such as we 
 found it in the Book of Exodus. To confirm this view of the 
 shekel we can cite the Bull's-head weight (fig. 27), which came 
 from Jerusalem, and weighs 36 '800 grammes, which represents 
 the amount of 5 light shekels (making allowance for a small 
 fracture), the light shekel being 8'4 grams. (130 grs.). It is plain 
 
THK SYSTEMS OF EGYPT, BABYLON, AND PALESTINE. 283 
 
 that this is a multiple of the light and not of the heavy shekel, 
 for it is not likely that such a multiple as 2^ would be employed. 
 On the other hand, we found the five-fold multiple of the light 
 shekel appearing in the Assyrian system, and also the Egyptian. 
 
 Fig. 27. BuU's-head Five-shekel Weight. 
 
 The Hebrew systems, as we have tentatively set them forth, 
 may be seen in the following tables. 
 
 I. Earliest period. Shekel of 130-5 grs. alone employed for 
 gold and probably silver. 
 
 II. Mosaic period. Gold and Silver. (The old light shekel 
 or ox-unit is now called shekel of the Sanctuary to distinguish 
 it from its double.) 
 
 50 light Shekels = 1 Maneh 
 3000 light Shekels = 60 Manehs = 1 Kikkar (talent). 
 
 III. Regal period. Gold. 
 
 100 light (= 50 double) shekels = 1 heavy Maneh 
 5000 heavy (= 10,000 light) „ = 100 heavy Manehs = 1 talent. 
 
 The same system was probably employed for silver and 
 copper, but instead of counting 100 light shekels to the Maneh 
 as in the case of gold, they reckoned silver and copper by 
 the double shekel, probably called the king's shekel in contra- 
 distinction to that of the Sanctuary. 
 
 IV. After the Return. The light shekel still retained for 
 gold, and the Babylonian, or Phoenician silver standard, em- 
 ployed for silver. 
 
284 THE SYSTEMS OF EGYPT, BABYLON, AND PALESTINE. 
 
 V. Maccabean Period. Gold on the old standard, and silve?' 
 (now first coined) struck on the Phoenician silver standard of 
 220 grains. 
 
 Copper was estimated most probably on the the old double 
 shekel system; and most likely the royal Assyrian heavy 
 system of 60 shekels to the maneh and 60 manehs to the 
 talent was adopted in its entirety for copper and other articles 
 of no great value in proportion to their bulk'. 
 
 ' We are uufortunately unable to gain any definite knowledge from Ezekiel 
 xlv., as i'. 12, which gives the weight system, is confused, and there is a great 
 discrepancy between the Hebrew and Greek texts. Though it is a prophetic 
 passage, there is no reason for supposing that the prophet did not clearly 
 understand the standard weight system of his time (600 B.C.), for his account 
 of the metric system is singularly clear. It is best to give the whole passage 
 as it appears in the Revised Version : " Thus saith the Lord God : Let it 
 suffice you, princes of Israel : remove violence and spoil, and execute judg- 
 ment and justice ; take away your exactions from my people, saith the Lord 
 God. Ye shall have just balances, and a just ephah, and a just bath. The 
 ephah and the bath shall be of one measure, that the bath may contain the 
 tenth part of an homer, and the ephah the tenth part of an homer: the 
 measure thereof shall be after the homer. And the shekel shall be twenty 
 gerahs ; twenty shekels, five and twenty shekels, fifteen shekels shall be your 
 maneh." (vv. 9 — 12.) One thing is clear at least, and that is that the passage 
 is a protest against over-exaction, and we may infer that the weight system 
 here mentioned is for precious metals, seeing that there is no mention made 
 of the talent. The shekel is to be 20 gerahs, that is, the shekel of the 
 Sanctuary. If the princes had sought to exact payment in royal shekels instead 
 of the old shekel, and also to make the maneh of silver contain 60 shekels 
 instead of 50, we can see every reason for the cry of the oppressed being loud. 
 
 The confusion in the Hebrew text may be due to the fact that there were 
 two manehs in use, that of 50 shekels for gold and silver, and that of 60 shekels 
 for other commodities. The Septuagint version is perfectly capable of explana- 
 tion on the principles which I have indicated. The LXX. runs thus ; khi to, 
 (TTd0fJ.ta etKOfft d^oXoii irhre gIkKol, irhrs koX aUXot, S^Ka Kcd trevT-fjKovTa ffiKKoi ij 
 luiS. ^o-TOi xiiuv. So Tischendorf. 
 
 There is a MS. (Cod. Al.) reading oi tt^ptc cLkKoi, koX tt^vts koX oi Sixa cIkKoi. 
 Tischendorf's text can hardly be right, wivTc Kal irkXoi, S&a,Ka! irevrijKovTa. contain 
 two most unnatural collocations. Uxa Kal irecT-^KoxT-a is absolutely absurd as 
 a way of expressing 60. ds Kal irevriiKovTa up to ivvia Kal irevT-fiKovra to express 
 51 to 59 are reasonable and found universally, but to add on 10 to one of the 
 main multiples of 10 in the decimal system is a method unknown, and is just 
 as absurd in Greek as it would be if in English we were to say 10 and 50, 
 meaning thereby 60. Again in the previous clause, the words Tivre Kal point to 
 some other numeral such as 10, or 20, as necessarily following. This is ob- 
 tained by taking the mk. reading Trivre Kal iiKa (tIkXoi, Kal -rrci/TiiKovTa, k.t.\. 
 
THE SYSTEMS OF EGYPT, BABYLON, AND PALESTINE. 285 
 
 Phoenician Standard. 
 
 The total loss of the literature and records of the Phoe- 
 nicians, and the fact that neither in their own country nor 
 in the greatest of their colonies, Carthage, did they employ 
 coined money until a comparatively late period, make the task 
 of restoring their weight system very difficult if not hopeless. 
 The silver standard called Phoenician or Graeco- Asiatic is the 
 sole evidence to show that they employed as their vinit for gold 
 the heavy Babylonian shekel of 260 grs. On the other hand 
 we have just seen that their close neighbours, the Hebrews, 
 from first to last, and the ancient people of the Nile with whom 
 the Phoenicians were in the closest trade relations (having 
 large trading communities settled in the Delta, and from whom 
 
 Now the LXX. gives the plural (rrdd/ua for " shekel " : crTdS/ua means the actual 
 weights employed in weighing the amounts of gold or silver so weighed. 
 Ezekiel is describing the various weight-units to be employed : " And the 
 weights are 20 gerahs (lupins), the five shekel weight, the fifteen shekel weight, 
 and fifty shekels shall be your maneh." The article oJ is very rightly used 
 before Trhre, for it refers to the well known multiple of the shekel, of which 
 we spoke above when dealing with the BuU's-head weight. The same explana- 
 tion may probably be given of the fifteen shekel weight. The maneh of 50 
 shekels of 20 gerahs each is the old maneh of the Sanctuary (Period II.), not 
 the royal maneh which contained 100 light shekels. 
 
 Now turning to the Hebrew version we find " twenty shekels, five and twenty 
 shekels and fifteen shekels," the sum of which makes a maneh of 60 shekels, 
 or the royal Assyrian and Hebrew commercial maneh. It is also to be observed 
 that the position of fifteen is unnatural ; it ought to come in the series before 
 "twenty" and "five and twenty." Fifty stands in the corresponding place in 
 LXX. Has the Hebrew text altered 50 into 15 so as to obtain a total of 60 ? 
 But there is another question ; Why do we find " five " and " fifteen " stand 
 first in LXX., and "twenty" and "twenty five" in Hebrew? On the theory, 
 that of the Septuagint translators, that the prophet is describing a series of 
 weight-pieces, it is quite simple. Combine the numbers of both versions, and 
 place them in order thus ; 1 shekel, 5 shekels, 15 shekels, 20 shekels, 25 shekels 
 (J maneh), 50 shekels (maneh). This gives a rational explanation of how the 
 discrepancy arose. The LXX. translated from a text which probably ran thus, 
 5 shekels, 10 shekels, 15 shekels, and went no further with the series. For it 
 is not at all improbable that the reading oi 5^/co is due to the fact that after oi 
 irhre alxKoi. stood ol SiKa, which was followed by oi irevreKalSeKO. cIkXoi. The 
 Jews of a later date, knowing only of the commercial mina of 60 shekels, left 
 out some of the numerals, and altered 50 into 15 to make up 60 shekels. 
 
286 THE SYSTEMS OP EGYPT, BABYLON, AND PALESTINE. 
 
 they had borrowed the hieroglyphic syllabic symbols, which 
 with them became the Alphabet), had employed the light 
 shekel, the only gold unit that likewise from first to last pre- 
 vailed throughout the vast regions of Central Asia Minor, and 
 as we have seen, was the unit of Greece even in the early days 
 when the great cities of Mycenae and Tiryns were in direct 
 contact with, and deriving their arts and civilization from Asia 
 or from Egypt. 
 
 The derivation of the Phoenician silver standard of about 
 22-5 grs. (14"58 gram.) according to the hitherto received doctrine 
 is as follows. As the Babylonians formed their silver standard 
 by making into ten pieces the amount of silver equivalent to 
 the "light gold shekel," so the Phoenicians and Syrians are 
 supposed to have divided the amount of silver equivalent to 
 " the heavy shekel " into fifteen pieces, gold being to silver in 
 each case as 13"3 : 1. But we ask why did the Phoenicians 
 adopt so awkward a scale as the quindecimal when it was 
 possible for them to employ the decimal or duodecimal ? In 
 the next place by the supposed system 7| silver shekels were 
 equal to one light shekel, that is the gold unit which was 
 universally employed amongst all the peoples with whom they 
 traded : and what number could be more awkward for purposes 
 of exchange than 1\ ? If therefore we can show that it is 
 probable that at one period silver was exceedingly abundant in 
 Phoenicia compared with gold, and that consequently gold was 
 worth considerably more than 13 times its weight in silver, the 
 sole support for the heavy shekel being the Phoenician unit is 
 removed, and the theory of the fifteen stater system falls to the 
 ground. It is well known that the Phoenicians had much of 
 the trade of Cilicia and the other coast regions of Asia Minor 
 in their hands. It was Cilicia that prodticed the chief supplies 
 of silver for Western Asia^ From this land therefore the 
 Phoenicians obtained vast quantities of silver, and it was from 
 them almost certainly the Egyptians, who had no native silver, 
 obtained a supply of that metal. But this was not all. About 
 1000 B.C. the Phoenicians, in their quest after new and un- 
 exhausted regions, made their way westward and reached 
 ^ Herod, m. 89, seqq. 
 
THE SYSTEMS OF EGYPT, BABYLON, AND PALESTINE. 287 
 
 Spain. I have already related the ancient stories which 
 embody the account of the marvellous amount of silver which 
 the first bold explorers brought back. We need not wonder 
 then if in the days of king Solomon, "silver was nothing ac- 
 counted of" in Syria and Palestine. We also saw that the 
 relative value of gold and silver was just as liable to fluctuate 
 in ancient, as in modern times, according to the supply of either 
 metal, and when we come to deal with the Greek system we 
 shall find many instances of this. If we then suppose that 
 gold was to silver as 17:1 in Phoenicia, the gold shekel of 
 130 grs. would be worth ten silver pieces of 220 grs. each. 
 (130 X 17 = 2210 ; ^f^ = 221). This is in reality far closer to 
 the actual weight of the coins than the result obtained by the 
 old hypothesis : 260 x 13-3 = 3466 ^ 15 = 231 grs. Troy, which 
 is about 10 grs. higher than the actual coin weights. 
 
 The approximation gained by our conjectural relation of 
 17:1, is far closer than that obtained by that of 133 : 1. The 
 conclusion is probable that silver was far cheaper in Phoenicia 
 and the contiguous coasts than elsewhere in Asia Minor, 
 and that it was natural that the weight of the silver unit 
 was increased in order to preserve the relation in value 
 between one gold unit, and ten silver units. Lastly we may 
 point out that at no place on the coast of Phoenicia or Asia 
 Minor, the region especially in contact with the Phoenicians, 
 do we, find gold pieces struck on the heavy shekel. Electrum 
 certainly was coined on this foot; but of this we shall be able to 
 give a satisfactory explanation. We have (with the exception 
 of some Lydian pieces) to go as far north as Thasos or Thrace 
 before we find a gold coin of such a nature, which is of course 
 nothing more than a double stater. 
 
 The Phoenician gold mina was probably like the Hebrew, 
 which was most likely borrowed from it, the fifty-fold of the 
 heavy shekel, 100 gold shekels and 100 silver shekels consti- 
 tuting a maneh, as amongst the Hebrews in the time of 
 Solomon. But we can conjecture with some probability that 
 at an earlier stage they weighed their gold and silver according 
 to the old common ox-unit, which we found in use among the 
 Hebrews under the name of the Holy Shekel or shekel of the 
 
288 THE 'systems of EGYPT, BABYLON, AND PALESTINE. 
 
 Sanctuary. No doubt the mina for gold always contained 100 
 light or 50 heavy shekels, and when their own peculiar shekel 
 of 220 grs. came into vogue for silver, 50 such shekels made a 
 mina. Finally, there can be little doubt that 60 minas in- 
 variably went to the talent. 
 
 In the case of commercial weights, it is most probable that 
 fiO heavy shekels made a mina: this is rendered almost perfectly 
 certain by the Lion weights with Phoenician as well as cunei- 
 form inscriptions found at Nineveh, 60 heavy minas forming a 
 heavy talent. 
 
 The Phoenician Colonies. 
 
 It is worth while before going further to enquire whether 
 we can gain any light from the systems of weight employed by 
 the famous daughter-cities of Phoenicia, such as Gades and 
 Carthage. A weight bearing in Punic characters the name of 
 the Agoranomos and the numeral 100 has been found at Jol 
 (Julia Caesarea) in North Africa, but urjfortuna.tely it has 
 suffered so much by corrosion from water and the loss of its 
 handle that it is impossible to make any tolerable approxima- 
 tion to its original weight. Hultsch' conjectures with some 
 probability that, making allowance for its loss, it represents 
 100 drachms, and deduces from this that the Carthaginians 
 treated the drachm as their shekel, but for this latter hypo- 
 thesis there seems no sufficient evidence. If this supposition 
 were true, the weight would represent a half-mina of the 
 Phoenician silver standard. But there is one thing which this 
 weight does prove, and that is that, whether it be a mina or 
 half-mina, it is the drachm or shekel, which was evidently 
 regarded as the unit of the system, not the mina. Thus once 
 more we get a confirmation of our general thesis that the mina 
 and talent are the multiples, and that it is the shekel or stater 
 which is the basis. Nor does the coinage of Carthage furnish 
 us with all the information that could be desired, for it was 
 only after 410 B.C. that that great " mart of merchants " began 
 to strike coins, and even then it was only in her Sicilian pos- 
 
 1 Metrol?, p. 420. 
 
THE SYSTEMS OF EGYPT, BABYLON, AND PALESTINE. 289 
 
 sessions that she did so, no doubt induced to adopt the practice 
 by constant contact with her Greek enemies : for not only the 
 type (of Persephone) was borrowed from Syracusan coins, but 
 the very dies were engraved by the hands of Greek artists. The 
 gold coins are struck on a standard of about 120 grs. Troy, whilst 
 the silver issue consists of tetradrachms of the so-called Attic 
 (or more simply light shekel or ox-unit) standard of 130 — 135 
 grs. Since during the same period (405 — 347 B.C.) Syracuse^ was 
 issuing gold pieces on the Attic standard, it is most probable 
 that it is only through the want of heavier specimens that we 
 are compelled to set the Siculo-Punic coins issued at Panormus 
 (Palermo) and other places in Italy so low as 120 grs. It 
 was not until about the time of Timoleon (340 B.C.) that money 
 was coined at Carthage itself. This coinage consists wholly 
 of gold, electrum and bronze, down to the time of the acqui- 
 sition of the rich silver mines of Spain, and the foundation of 
 New Carthage in that country by Hasdrubal, the son-in-law of 
 Hamilkar Barca and brother-in-law of Hannibal, in the interval 
 between the First and Second Punic wars (241 — 218 B.C.), 
 when large silver coins both Carthaginian and Hispano-Cartha- 
 ginian seem to have been first struck^. 
 
 The gold and electrum coins of the first period are of 
 the following weights: gold 145 and 73 grs.; electrum 118, 
 58 and 27 grains. The gold unit is thus some 10 grains 
 higher than the normal value of the ox-unit. If these coins 
 belonged to an earlier period we might with some confidence 
 affirm that the variation was due to the plentiful supply of 
 gold derived by the Carthaginians from the still unexhausted 
 gold deposits of Western Africa. This is perhaps the true 
 explanation even at the late period when the coins were issued, 
 but there may have been a desire to adjust the three metals, 
 gold, electrum and silver, so that they might be conveniently 
 exchanged. It will be observed that the electrum coins are 
 struck on a unit of 118 grs., and it is not at all improbable that 
 silver was reckoned by the same unit, even though not yet 
 coined ; for when the silver coins appear they are struck on a 
 standard of 118 or 236 grs. It will be at once noticed that 
 1 Metrol.^, p. 153. ' Head, op. cit. p. 789. 
 
 R 19 
 
290 THE SYSTEMS OF EGYPT, BABYLON, AND PALESTINE. 
 
 this standard is considerably higher than the Phoenician silver 
 standard found along the coasts of Asia Minor. It may thus 
 have been found convenient to raise by a few grains the weight 
 of the gold unit so as to harmonize the relations between the 
 three metals. Further speculation is vain, as we do not know 
 the proportion of gold contained in the electrum coins'. From 
 what we shall shortly learn about the electrum of Cyzicus, 
 it is not impossible that the gold piece of 73 grs. was worth 
 an electrum stater of 118 grs. 
 
 Coming to the Phoenicians of Spain we find that Gades, 
 which did not begin her coinage until about 250 B.C., employed 
 a standard for her silver of 78 grains, and that the island of 
 Ebusus (Iviza) struck didrachms of 154 grs., a half-drachm of 
 39 grs. and a quarter-drachm. This coincides closely with the 
 78 grain drachm of Gades. It is palpable that there is no 
 connection between this standard and the Phoenician standard 
 of 220 grs. As the same system is found in the cities of 
 Emporiae and Ehoda {Ampurias and Rosas) in the north-east 
 of Spain, and in the earliest drachms of Massilia {Marseillesy, 
 it is far more reasonable to suppose that the relations between 
 gold and silver throughout Spain were such that, in order to 
 make a certain fixed number of silver pieces equivalent to the 
 gold ox-unit, it was found necessary to make the silver didrachm 
 of about 156 grs. and the drachm of 78 grs. 
 
 It would thus seem that the principle which we shall seek 
 to establish for the Greek silver standards held true of the 
 Phoenician likewise, — that whilst the gold unit, the basis of all 
 weight, remains unchanged or was but very slightly modified 
 even at a late period (when the idea of the original ox-unit 
 must have become dimmed by time), in order to effect a more 
 complete harmonizing of a threefold system of gold, electrum 
 and silver, the silver units shew every kind of variety, which 
 can only be accounted for by supposing that owing to the 
 different relations between gold and silver in various regions 
 
 1 The amount of gold in electrum varies greatly. Pliny, H. N. xxxiii. 4. 23, 
 ubioumque quinta argenti portio est, et electrum uoeatur. The Carthaginian 
 electrum probably came from Spain (ep. p. 94). 
 
 ^ Head, op. cit. p. 2. 
 
THE SYSTEMS OF EGYPT, BABYLON, AND PALESTINE. 291 
 
 and at various periods in the same regions, it was foimd 
 necessary from time to time to increase or diminish the 
 weight of the silver unit. Thus if gold was to silver as 
 12 : 1 in the 3rd century B.C., we find a ready explanation for 
 the standard of Gades and Emporiae. The gold unit of 
 ISOgrs. would be worth ten silver units of 156 grs. each 
 (130 X 12 = 1560 H- 10 = 156). So too the 118 gr. standard of 
 Carthage may be explained by supposing that gold was to 
 silver as 11:1; for then 1 gold unit of 130 grs. =12 silver 
 of 118 grs. each (130 x 11 = 1430^ 12 = 119 grs), duodecimal 
 division perhaps being preferred to the decimal owing to the 
 relations between electrum and silver, the former perhaps being 
 as in Lydia' counted at 10 times the value of the latter. If 
 gold was to silver as 12 : 1, and electrum to silver as 8:1, 
 electrum being thus nearly two-thirds gold, one gold piece 
 of 75 grs. = 1 piece of electrum of 118 grains, and 8 pieces 
 of silver of 116 grs. each (75 x 12 = 900 ; 116x8 = 928), and 
 1 piece of electrum of 118 was worth 8 pieces of silver of 
 116 grs. each. All this is, be it remembered, purely conjectural, 
 as. we know nothing of the actual relations existing between 
 any pair of the metals. 
 
 However, when we come to deal with the electrum of Cyzicus 
 we shall be able to produce some data, which will at least show 
 that our suggested explanation of the relations existing between 
 gold, electrum and silver at Carthage is not purely chimerical. 
 
 Lastljr comes the question of the commercial weight-system. 
 We have already spoken of the badly preserved weight from 
 Jol, but we could not say whether it was used for the precious 
 metals,' or more ordinary merchandize. However, the great 
 Phoenician inscription of Marseilles, already referred to, makes 
 it plain that even in the weighing of meat they reckoned by 
 the shekel and not by the mina; for we find in it mention 
 of 300 [shekels] and 150 [shekels] of flesh from the victims. 
 This completely accords with the 20 shekels of food mentioned 
 by Ezekiel (iv. 10), and clearly indicates that even in what 
 we may well believe to be the heavy commercial shekel, the 
 ancient decimal system had not been superseded by the sexa- 
 1 Pliny, H. N. xxxiv. 
 
 19—2 
 
292 THE SYSTEMS OF EGYPT, BABYLON, AND PALESTINE. 
 
 gesimal; and, further, that the mina had not succeeded in 
 supplanting the more ancient fashion of counting by shekels; 
 for had such been the case, the weight of the meat would have 
 been expressed in 6 manehs, or 3 manehs. This piece of 
 evidence confirms the results which we arrived at in the case 
 of the Hebrews — that it was only at a later period that reckon- 
 ing by manehs came into use. The Phoenician colonies of the 
 West, including Carthage herself, had probably been planted 
 before the influences of the Chaldaean system had obtained 
 a solid footing in Palestine. We may however not unreason- 
 ably believe that the Carthaginians employed some such form 
 of talent as we find in the Book of Exodus, 3000 shekels 
 (50 X 60 = 3000) going to the talent, though as yet no record has 
 revealed to us the actual existence of either talent or mina. 
 
CHAPTER XI. 
 The Lydian and Persian Systems. 
 
 " The Lydians," says Herodotus, " were the fii-st of all na- 
 tions we know who struck gold and silver coin'," a tradition 
 also attested by Xenophanes of Colophon, according to Julius 
 Pollux ^ These statements of the ancient writei-s ai-e con- 
 firmed by an examination of the earliest essays made in Asia 
 in the art of coining ; from which the best numismatists have 
 been led to ascribe it to the seventh centiu-y B.C. and probably 
 to the reign of Gyges, who from being a shepherd, bj' means 
 of the •■ \Ti"tuous ring" became the founder of the great dynasty 
 of the ilermnadae, and of the new Lydian empire as distin- 
 guished from the Lydia of a more remote antiquity. The 
 first issues of the Lydian mint were rudely executed coins 
 of electrum, being staters and smaller coins of the standards 
 usually known as the Babj'lonian smd Phoenician, of which the 
 earliest statei-s weigh about 167 and 220 grs. respectively'. It 
 is most likely that the Babylonian standard was intended for 
 commerce ^\'ith the interior of Asia Minor, and the Phoenician 
 for transactions with the cities of the western seaboai-d, to 
 coincide with the silver standards in use in these respective 
 regions. The proportion of gold and silver in ele'jJ-um is es- 
 
 ' Herod, i. 94, xpOrm. H arOpiirup, tS>p iuaeis tSfLoi, nnuriia xpvffou xoi dp-) I'pov 
 
 - Julias Pollux, IX. 83. 
 * Head, op. cit. p. 544. 
 
294 THE LYDIAN AXD PERSIAN SYSTEMS. 
 
 ceedingly variable : according to Pliny' any gold alloyed with 
 one-fifth of silver (and by implication any containing any 
 higher proportion of silver) was called electmm. We shall 
 soon find that the electrum staters of Cyzicus contained about 
 an equal amount of either metal; but the analysis of Lydian 
 electrum gives a proportion of 73 per cent, of gold to 27 per 
 cent, of silver, or practically 3 to 1. As gold in the central 
 parts of Asia Minor stood to silver as 13 3 : 1 in the reign 
 of Darius and probably long before, we may not unreasonably 
 assume that such also was the relation between them in the 
 reign of Gyges, at least in the interior. In this case electrum 
 would stand to silver as 10 : 1, a proportion exceedingly con- 
 venient for exchange, as a single standard served for both metals, 
 one electrum ingot of 168 grs. being equal to 10 silver ingots of 
 like weight. We have already seen that one gold unit of 130 grs. 
 was equivalent to 10 silver units of 168 grs., therefore the gold 
 ox-unit was exactly represented in value by the electrum ingot of 
 168 grs., for, according to our statement of the composition of the 
 Lydian electrum, 168 grs. of that alloy would contain 126 grs. 
 of pure gold. If we were certain that on the coast of Asia 
 Minor the relation between gold and silver was 13"3 : 1, we 
 should be compelled to follow Brandis and the rest in making 
 the double gold shekel of 260 grs. equal to 15 silver shekels 
 of 220 gi-s. each ; again, if we accept as universal the relation 
 of gold to electrum as 4 : 3, and accordingly make one piece 
 of electrum of 220 grs. equal to 10 silver pieces of the same 
 standard, we shall find it impossible to obtain any convenient 
 relation between the gold stater of 130 grs. and the electrum 
 stater of 220 grs. But from this difficulty it is not hard to 
 find an escape : 224 grs. of electrum = 168 grs. of gold ; that is 
 exactly 1^ gold shekels (J-|i = 43 x 4 = 172). The division into 
 thirds and sixths is of course a well-known feature in the 
 coinage of the Asiatic coast-towns. Thus there would be no 
 practical difficulty in the ordinary monetary transactions, for 
 three Phoenician drachms of electrum (=168 grs.) would = 1 
 gold shekel ; and 4 gold Thirds (Tritae), or 8 gold SiKths 
 (Hectae), would equal one electrum stater of 224 — 220 grs. 
 
 ' H. N. xxxiii. 4, 23, ubiuumque quinta argenti portio est, et electrum uocatur. 
 
THE LYDIAN AND PERSIAN SYSTEMS. 295 
 
 If on the other hand silver held a lower value in relation 
 to gold on the coasts of the Aegean, and the electrum em- 
 ployed in that quarter was alloyed to a greater extent with 
 silver, two disturbing elements are introduced. The proba- 
 bilities are in favour of silver being cheaper in Cilicia and the 
 contiguous region, and most certainly at Cyzicus the electrum 
 was half silver, whilst the Phocaic electrum had a bad name 
 in antiquity, since according to Hesychius Phocaic gold was 
 synonymous with bad gold. Is it then possible that 220 grains 
 of electrum were equivalent to 130 grs. of pure gold ? This 
 gives about 60 per cent, of gold. If gold was to silver as 
 13'5 : 1, the gold unit of 130 grs. is equal to 8 silver pieces 
 of 220 grs. (130 x 13'3 = 176-5 ^ 8 = 220-6). In our present 
 state of knowledge it is impossible to decide in favour of 
 either view, but it is at least evident that some such rela- 
 tion and adjustment must have existed between the three 
 metals. In fact the problem which the Lydians tried to solve 
 was not merely that of Bimetallism, but of Trimetallism. 
 
 These early electrum coins ai-e simply bullet-shaped lumps 
 of metal, like the so-called bean money formerly employed by 
 
 Fig. 28. Lydian electrum coin. 
 
 the Japanese, having what is termed the obverse plain or 
 rather striated, as a series of lines in relief run across the 
 coin, whilst the reverse has three incuse depressions, that in 
 the centre oblong, the others square. The coin here figured 
 (from the British Museum specimen) is on the Babylonian silver 
 standard (166-8 gi-s.), but it is on the staters of Phoenician 
 standard that we first find any attempt at types or symbols. 
 The idea of engraving some symbol on the punches used for 
 stamping the incuse depressions was in truth the grand step 
 
296 THE LYDIAN AND PERSIAN SYSTEMS. 
 
 towards the creation of a real coin. Thus a stater of 219 grs. 
 which bears in the central incuse a running fox, in the upper 
 square a stag's head, and the lower an X-like device, may be 
 regarded as the first complete coin as yet known. It would 
 seem from this, therefore, that it was on the coast-region, where 
 the Lydians came into contact with the artistic genius of the 
 Greeks, that the real start in the art of striking money took 
 place. Electrum was employed because it was found native 
 in great quantities in the whole district which lay ai-ound 
 Sardis, in the valleys of Tmolus, and the sands of Pactolus. 
 The ancients found considerable difficulty in freeing the gold 
 from the associated silver (p. 97). 
 
 Once known, Miletus and other important Ionian cities 
 were not long in improving on the Lydian invention. The 
 advantages of a metallic currency were so obvious that an 
 intelligent and progressive race hastened to avail themselves 
 of it. "Only those," says Captain Gill (speaking of the borders 
 of Thibet and China), " who have gone through the weary pro- 
 cess of cutting up and weighing out lumps of silver, disputing 
 over the scale, and asserting the quality of the metal, can ap- 
 preciate our feelings of satisfaction at being once more able 
 to make payments in coin'." No sooner had the lonians com- 
 menced coining than they appear to have adorned the face of 
 the ingot with a symbol, probably both as a guarantee of weight 
 and purity, and perhaps as a preventive of fraudulent abrasion. 
 During this period it is not improbable that the arts of Ionia 
 had made their influence felt in Lydia, and hence " it is im- 
 possible to distinguish with absolute certainty the Lydian 
 issues from those of the Greek towns, but there is one type 
 which seems to he especially characteristic of Lydia as it 
 occurs in a modified form on the coinage attributed to the 
 Sardian mint and to the reign of Croesus; this is the Lion 
 and the Bull. These coins have on the obverse the fore- 
 fronts of a lion and a bull turned away from one another and 
 joined by theii- necks^" whilst the reverse shows three incuse 
 depressions. This is Phoenician in weight (215-4 grs.). There 
 
 ^ River of Golden Sand, ii. p. 78. 
 2 Head, op. cit. p. 545. 
 
THE LYDIAN AND PEllSIAN SYSTEMS. 297 
 
 are other coins, often attributed to Miletus, which may be as- 
 signed to Lj'dia ; some with a recumbent lion on the obverse, 
 and a reverse exhibiting the fox, stag's head, and X of the 
 coin already described. To these may be added a series of 
 coins bearing a lion's head with open mouth, and with what 
 is commonly regarded as a star_ above it, but which is more 
 probably part of the lion's hair, and on the reverse incuse 
 sinkings, in some cases containing an ornamental star'. These 
 coins have now with great probability been assigned by the 
 eminent numismatist, Mr J. P. Six, to the Lydian king, 
 Alyattes, the father of Croesus. 
 
 When Croesus ascended the throne in 568 B.C., one of his 
 earliest acts seems to have been an attempt to propitiate the 
 Greeks both of Asia and Hellas proper by sending offerings 
 of equal value to the two most famous shrines of Apollo, Delphi 
 and Branchidae. In the course of some fourteen years he 
 reduced under the sway of Lydia all the regions that lay be- 
 tween the river Halys and the sea. " It seems probable (says 
 Mr Head) that the introduction of a double currency of pure 
 gold and silver, in place of the primitive electrum, may have 
 been due to the commercial genius of Croesus." If this be so, 
 the monarch seems to have acted with thrift in his offerings, 
 for according to Herodotus his dedications at Delphi were 
 all of white gold, i.e.- electrum. Perhaps then he got no more 
 than he deserved when, induced by the declaration of the 
 Delphic prophetess that he would destroy a mighty kingdom, 
 he made war upon Cyrus with disastrous issue. There however 
 can be no doubt that Croesus made some important monetary 
 change, for in after years there still remained a clear tradition 
 of Croesus' stater (KpotVetos a-Tari^p), just as the famous gold 
 stater of Philip of Macedon was known as the Philippean or 
 Fhilippus^. In his monetary reform Croesus seems to have had 
 regard to the weights of the two old electrum staters, each of 
 
 1 Ibid. p. 503. 
 
 ' Pollux, III. 87, ei5(SK(|Uos Si Kal 6 Tvyddas XP"'^''^ '^"^ "' Kpolffetoi (TTarljpcs : 
 ix. 84 sq., fous Si dvoiiaTinv KO-TaKbyif irpoariKovcrii' ol Kpola-aoi ffTaTrjpes Kal ^Mir- 
 ireioi, Kal Aapei\ol, Kai ri BepeviKe'ioi' v6p.urp.a Kal 'AXc^avSpfioii, koj. nToAe/iOuw 
 Kal ArniapeTelov, k.t.X. 
 
298 THE LYDIAN AND PERSIAN SYSTEMS. 
 
 which was now represented by an equal value, though not of 
 course by an equal weight, of pure gold. 
 
 Thus the old Phoenician electrum stater of 220 grs. was 
 replaced by a pure gold coin of 168 grs., cr^uivalent like its 
 predecessor in electrum to 10 silver staters of 220 grs. each, and 
 the old Babylonian electrum stater of 168 grs. was replaced by 
 a new pure gold stater of 126 grs., equal in value like it to 10 
 silver staters of 168gi's. each, "as now for the first time coined." 
 These gold coins bear as obverse the foreparts of a lion and 
 a bull facing each other, and on the reverse an oblong incuse 
 
 Fig. 29. Coin of Croesus. 
 
 divided into two parts (Fig. 29). Of the Babylonian standard 
 we find : 
 
 Stater 168 grs. 
 
 Trite 56 „ 
 
 Hecte 28 „ 
 
 Hemihecton 14 „ 
 
 And of the light shekel : 
 
 Stater 126gr,s. 
 
 Trite 42 
 
 Hecte 21 „ 
 
 Hemihecton 11 „ 
 
 Of Babylonian standard silver : 
 
 Stater 168 grs. 
 
 ^ stater 84 
 
 ^ stater 56 „ 
 
 j'5 stater 14 „ 
 
THE LYDIAN AND PERSIAN SYSTEMS. 299 
 
 This double standard for gold is at first sight somewhat 
 strange until we observe that the two systems are in complete 
 harmony. For the gold piece of 168 grs. is nothing more than 
 U of the light shekel (168 ^| = 126 grs.). The third of the 
 light shekel (42 grs.) is the fourth of the Babylonian of 168 grs. 
 There can be no doubt that the coins of 168 grs. were simply 
 an experiment suggested by the coincidence that the number 
 of grains (168) in the Babylonian silver shekel was exactly one- 
 quarter more than those in the light gold shekel, in the hope 
 doubtless of obtaining a single standard for gold electrum and 
 silver. The division of the silver stater into thirds would 
 facilitate the process of exchange, as 13 silver staters and one- 
 third would be equivalent to the gold piece of the same Baby- 
 lonian standard, whilst 10 silver staters would be equivalent to 
 one of the old electrum pieces of 168 grs. It is at all events 
 certain that the standard of 168 grs. was not a regular gold 
 unit, for it simply makes its appearance for a brief space, there 
 being no trace of it at any earlier period, nor does it afterwards 
 appear save in its own legitimate province of silver. A perfectly 
 analogous case is that of the gold pieces struck by the Ptole- 
 maic kings, who, starting with the gold stater of Philip and 
 Alexander and the Phoenician standard for silver (after the 
 founder of the dynasty had for a short time used the so-called 
 Rhodian standard), presently struck gold pieces on the same 
 standard as their silver. But the experiment of Croesus, if 
 such it was, did not succeed. For the eastern mind was still 
 too much impressed with the necessity of cleaving fast to the 
 original weight unit obtained from the ancient unit of barter. 
 For whether the attempt had failed before the reign of Croesus 
 was brought to a sudden end by the conquests of the great 
 Cyrus, or whether he continued up to the very hour of the 
 Persian conquest to coin, at least for one part of his dominions, 
 the gold pieces of the Babylonian silver standard, it matters 
 little. As we have no evidence on the point, we cannot say 
 whether there were two gold miuae and two gold talents in 
 use, one being of course the ordinary gold talent (called 
 Euboic) of 3000 light shekels of 130 grs., the other containing 
 3000 shekels of 168 grs. each. The probability I think is that 
 
300 THE LYDIAN AND PERSIAN SYSTEMS. 
 
 only the former existed. As 50 of the latter shekels made 
 1^ minae, there was no practical difficulty in making any calcu- 
 lations; on the other hand, if there had been two separate minae, 
 and two separate talents, it would have led to great compli- 
 cations. The fact that we hear nothing about any such second 
 gold system existing in Asia, and that when Darius fixed the 
 tribute from each region he did not make it the basis of his 
 payment, which he would probably have done as he would thus 
 have made a considerable gain, by causing the payments in 
 gold as well as those in silver to be made on the Babylonian 
 standard, seems to put beyond all doubt that the 168 grain gold 
 piece was not a real unit, but was simply regarded as 1^ shekels, 
 and was nothing more than a temporary effort to simplify the 
 trimetallic monetary system of Lydia. 
 
 What system the Lydians employed for commercial purposes 
 we have no means of knowing, but we may conjecture plausibly 
 that the light royal mina of 60 shekels was the standard em- 
 ployed. 
 
 The Persian Standard. 
 
 We may adopt the generally received belief that the Per- 
 sians, like the Medes and Babylonians, did not coin money 
 (although they were probably acquainted with the Lydian 
 stater) until after the conquest of Asia Minor and Egypt by 
 Cyrus and Cambyses, and the reorganization of the empire by 
 Darius the son of Hystaspes (522 — 485 B.C.). For although the 
 learned savants MM. Oppert and Kdvillout' hold that Daric 
 (AapeiKo'i) is unconnected with the name Darius (Aapeto?), 
 an opinion supported by Dr Hoffmann^, and rather regard it as 
 derived from the Assyrian darag viana, " degree (i.e. ^}^) of a 
 mina," and although Mr G. Bertin has read the word dariku on 
 a Babylonian contract, dated in the twelfth year of Nabonidas, 
 five years before the conquest of Babylon by Cyrus', it does 
 not at all follow that either darag or dariku refers to a 
 
 1 Annuaire de Numismatique, 1884, p. 119. 
 
 2 Zeitschr.fiir Assyrlologie. Vol. ii. 48 (1887). 
 
 ' Proceedings of the Society of Biblical Archaeology, 1883 — 4, p. 87. 
 
THE LTDIAN AND PERSIAN SYSTEMS. 301 
 
 coin. That the unit was employed for gold ages before the 
 Persians ever descended from the mountains there can be little 
 doubt But whether we adopt or reject the Greek tradition 
 that the Daric (Aapetwo?) was named from Darius, as the 
 Philippean and Croesean staters were called after the sovereigns 
 who first struck them, it is perfectly certain that Darius or- 
 ganized the whole numbering system of the great empire to 
 which he had succeeded, and that he coined gold pieces of the 
 first quality : for Herodotus tells us that Darius, having refined 
 gold to the gi-eatest extent possible, had coin struck^. This 
 would be very analogous to the course pursued by Croesus and 
 Philip; gold in some form was current in the dominions of both 
 these princes before their reigns, but it was owing to certain 
 reforms introduced and to the issue of a gold coin of a certain 
 pattern, that the names of both became associated with par- 
 ticular kinds of gold coins. By the time of Xerxes the son of 
 Darius vast quantities of these Darics were circulating through 
 Asia Minor, for Herodotus relates that the Lydian Pythius had 
 in his own possession as many as 3,993,000 of them, a sum 
 afterwards increased by Xerxes to 4,000,000. They became 
 the gold currency of all the Greek towns not only of Asia Minor, 
 but also of the islands, and made their way in considerable 
 quantities into the great cities of the mainland of Hellas, and 
 wrought as much harm in disuniting the various states of 
 Greece as did the gold staters of Philip at a period a little 
 later. Darics formed a regular part of the wealth of a well-to-do 
 Athenian at the time of the Peloponnesian war. Thus Lysias^ 
 relates that when his house was entered and plundered by the 
 minions of the Thirty, his money chest contained 100 Darics, 
 400 Cyzicenes, and 3 talents of silver. It is only necessary to 
 enumerate some of the passages in the Greek authors, where 
 mention is made of their coins, to show how wide an in- 
 fluence they exercised in the eastern Mediterranean. Besides 
 Herodotus and Lysias already mentioned, Thucydides, Aristo- 
 
 ^ IV. 166, Aapaos fi,iv yap xp^"^"" KaBaptiraTov Aire^-fyras It ri SwariSiTaTov 
 vi/xuT/Mi eKb\j/aTO. 
 
 ^ Or. XII. 70 Tpla T&Xavra apyvplov Kal TerpaKocrlovt Kv^iKrjVods Kal CKarbv 
 SapetKoiit Kal ^id\as dpyvpiov T^traapas. 
 
302 THE LYDIAN AND PERSIAN SYSTEMS. 
 
 phanes, Xenophon, Demosthenes, Arrian, Diodorus and many 
 others all make mention of these famous coins'. No classifi- 
 cation of them according to the reigns of the monarchs by 
 whom they were issued is possible, for this is precluded by the 
 absence of all inscriptions, and the great uniformity of style. 
 They bear on the obverse the king of Persia bearded crowned 
 and clad in a long robe; he kneels towards the right on one 
 knee ; on his back is a quiver, in his right hand is a long spear, 
 and in his outstretched left a bow (from which came the familiar 
 ■ Greek name of Archers for these pieces). The reverse is simply 
 marked by an oblong incuse. 
 
 Their weight may be set at ISOgrs., which of course is the 
 light shekel or ox-unit. We have no difficulty in fixing the 
 gold mina or talent. In fact we have already seen on p. 260 that 
 the Persian talent of gold was the same as the Euboic-Attic 
 talent. Hence 
 
 1 Daric =130grs. 
 50 Darics = 1 mina = 6,500 grs. 
 3000 Darics = 60 minas = 1 talent = 390,000 grs. 
 
 For silver currency the Persians employed half of the Baby- 
 lonian silver stater of 168 grs., its usual weight being about 
 84 grs. This coin was in every way similar to the Daric and 
 in fact is sometimes called by the same name by writers of 
 a later age'', but the more usual appellation in the classical 
 writers was the Median siglos (MT)BiKd<; o-t'iyXo?) or simply sighs. 
 Twenty of these sigli were equivalent to one gold Daric, for 
 Xenophon appears to count 3000 Darics as equal to 10 talents 
 of silver, or in other words to 60,000 sigli (6000 x 10 = 60,000). 
 The siglos may therefore be regarded as the Persian drachm 
 or half-stater. As 130 grains of gold are thus made equal to 
 1680 grs. of silver (84 x 20), gold held to silver the old ratio 
 of 13 : 1. 
 
 > Thuc. vm. 28 ; Xen. An. i. 1. 9 ; i. 3. 21 ; i. 7. 18 ; v. 6. 18 ; vii. 6. 1 ; 
 C%jrop. V. 27 J Dem. xxiv. 129; Aristoph. Bed. 602; Arrian Anab. iv. 18. 7; 
 Diod. XVII. 66, etc. 
 
 2 Plutarch, Gimon, x. 11, 0ia\os S6o, ttiv ij.h dpyvpdav ^nTr\7i<rafievov AapHKwv, 
 
THE LYDIAN AND PERSIAN SYSTEMS. 303 
 
 The Persian silver standard was formed thus : 
 
 1 siglos = 84 grs. 
 100 sigli =50 staters = 1 mina =8400 grs. 
 6000 sigli = 3000 staters = 60 minae = 1 talent = 504,000 grs. 
 
 As regards commercial weight we may fairly assume that 
 the old light and heavy royal systems continued in use in the 
 respective regions where they had been employed in early days. 
 
CHAPTER XII. 
 
 The Greek System. 
 
 We are now come to the most important portion of our 
 task, the development of the Greek and Italic systems. In 
 the Homeric Poems we found the Talanton (or value of a cow 
 in gold) the sole unit of weight, and that only employed for 
 gold. This Talanton has been shown to be the same in weight 
 as the light gold shekel of Asia Minor, which, under the form 
 of coin, we have just been discussing as the Croesean stater 
 and Persian Daric. It was therefore nothing else than the 
 Euboic or Attic stater of historical times, which at all periods 
 and at all places that fall within our knowledge formed the sole 
 unit for the weighing of gold. 
 
 Besides the Talanton based on the ox, there was in all 
 probability another higher unit in occasional use in Greece 
 Proper. This was the threefold of the ox-unit. We have 
 already had occasion to notice the small gold talent, called 
 by some writers the Macedonian, which was equal to three 
 Attic staters. The same weight under the name of the 
 Sicilian talent was employed likewise for gold only in the 
 Greek colonies of Sicily and Southern Italy. The conserva- 
 tism of colonists is too well known to need illustration, and 
 we may with high probability infer that the Greek settlers in 
 Magna Graecia brought the small talent from their original 
 homes. What was the origin of this weight ? We have seen 
 that everywhere all over our area the slave is the occasional 
 higher unit. Thus the Irish slave (cumhal) was a unit of 
 account equal to three cows. The slave in the Welsh Laws is 
 equal to 4 cows, whilst in Homer we found a slave woman 
 
THE GREEK SYSTEM. 305 
 
 valued at 4 cows also. From the way in which this notice of 
 her price occurs, it is probable that Achilles did not give 
 a woman of the most ordinary kind as a prize, for had she 
 been the ordinary slave-woman of account, there would have 
 been no need to mention the price, as any one would have 
 known how many cows exactly she was worth. It is then not 
 improbable that three cows were commonly reckoned as the 
 value of a slave, and accordingly the small gold talent, which 
 is the multiple of the ox-unit, is simply the metallic repre- 
 sentative of the slave, just as the Homeric Talanton itself is 
 that of the cow. 
 
 What the exact weight of this unit was on Greek soil we 
 are now enabled to ascertain by the aid of the treatise on the 
 Constitution of the Athenians known to the ancients as the 
 work of Aristotle, and the brilliant discovery and identification 
 of which by the officials of the British Museum reflects much 
 credit on British scholarship. 
 
 We had previously known from Plutarch (who ascribed the 
 first coinage of Athens to Theseus') that amongst his other 
 reforms Solon caused drachms to be coined of lighter weight 
 than those previously in currency, so that 100 of the new ones 
 would be equal in value to 73 old ones. Some scholars have 
 inferred that this was an expedient for relieving debtors, who 
 would be allowed to pay in the new coin debts contracted in 
 the older currency. The newly discovered Constitution dispels 
 this assumption, and also aifords us some most valuable ad- 
 ditional matter- : " In his Laws then he appears to have made 
 these enactments in favour of the people, but before his 
 legislation he appears to have wrought the cancelling of 
 debts, and afterwards the augmentation of the measures and 
 weights, and the augmentation of the currency. For in his 
 
 ' Thes. XXV. , &o^e Se vi/iurtm podv iyxapd^as. 
 
 ^ p. 27 (ch. 10) (Kenyon's ed.), iv iikv oSv tois vd/wis ravra So/cei deivai. STjfWTiKd, 
 irpb bk TTJs vofioBeaias TroiTjffdffdat Trjv xptwi/ aTroKOTn}^, Kol fiera ravra r-qp re rwv 
 fj^p(i)V Kal rutv aradfjuov Kal rijv rod vofjUcrfiaros aH^ritriv. ctt' 4k€Ipov ykp ey^vero 
 Kai Tct fxh-pa fiei^ta rStv ^eLdojveioJVj Kol ij ^va Tp6repov 'ix°^^^ TrapairKij<Ti,ov 4^do- 
 liTIKOvra SpaxMs dveirX-ripiiBri ra'is iicarbv. riv 5' b apxaioi x«P<"f'''-)//) SlSpaxP-ov. 
 iwolii<re di Kal araBn&v irpbs ro vS/uana rpeis Kal i^riKovra fii/ds rb rakavrov dyoiaas, 
 Kal iiriSiereiiridTiaav al pu/ai rif ararijpi. Kal tois aWois a-raSfiois. 
 
 K. 20 
 
306 THE GREEK SYSTEM. 
 
 day the measures likewise were made larger than those of 
 Pheidon, and the mina, which previously had almost seventy 
 drachms, was filled up by a hundred drachms'. But the ancient 
 type was the didrachm^ and he also made as a standard^ for 
 his coinage 63 minas weighing the talent, and the minae were 
 apportioned out by the stater, and the other weights." 
 
 The first point to engage our attention is the formation of 
 a new standard for the silver coin (for no gold was coined for 
 nearly two centuries): sixty-three old minas were taken to 
 form a new talent, which of course was divided henceforward 
 into 60 new minas. As the weight of the Attic talent in post- 
 Solonian times is most accurately known, we can at once dis- 
 cover the weight of the ancient mina by dividing the ordinary 
 weight of the talent (405,000 grs.) by 63 : 405,000 -r- 63 = 6428 
 gi-s., that is 322 grs. less than the post-Solonian mina of 6750 
 grs. As there are 50 staters in the mina, the ancient stater 
 weighed 128-56 grs., or just a grain lighter than the Daric 
 (129-6 grs.). The old mina of 6428 grs. had been equal to 
 70 drachms ; each of these then must have weighed 92 grs. 
 nearly, that is, the ordinary weight of an Aeginetic drachm. 
 There can be no doubt that the coins of Aegina were used as 
 
 Fig. bO. Coin of Eretria. 
 
 currency at Athens before Solon's time, where they circulated 
 side by side in all probability with the coins of Euboea which 
 bore the bull's head, whence arose the tradition of the earliest 
 
 ' I have translated the irapb. [juKfmv\ of Kaibel and Wilamowitz instead 
 of Kenyon's irapairMiaiov. According to Plutarch (Solon. 15) the old (silver) 
 mina contained 73 drachma. The apparent discrepancy is easily explained. 
 In the prae-Solonian mina there were 70 drachma of 92 gra. each. Plutarch 
 writing at a later time took the number of drachms of 92 grs. in the post- 
 Solonian mina of 6750, which ia just 73. The information supplied by the 
 Polity is evidently older and better. 
 
 2 The. Eeinsch needlessly regards ^c 5* 6 Apxam k.t.X. as an interpolation. 
 
 ' Kaibel and Wilamowitz read araeixa instead of aTadiwr. 
 
THE GREBK SYSTEM. 307 
 
 coinage of Athens consisting of didrachms stamped with an ox. 
 The old mina (63 of which went to the new silver talent) 
 was of course the ancient standard used for weighing gold 
 and silver before coined money was employed. It was that 
 known as the Euboic, based on the ox-unit. The Aeginetic 
 standard was only used for silver, gold at all times being 
 weighed by the Euboic standard even where the Aeginetic 
 was in use for silver. This standard was of course in full use 
 for gold and evidently likewise for silver in prae-Solonian times, 
 even though the Aeginetic drachms passed as currency at 
 Athens. For if they had adopted the Aeginetic standard, 100 
 Aeginetic drachms would have been reckoned to the mina, but 
 as only 70 drachms went to the mina it is evident that the old 
 ox-unit (so-called Euboic) standard of unit 130 grs. with its 
 corresponding mina was always the national Athenian standard. 
 
 We showed at an earlier stage that in the age when the 
 art of coining was first introduced into Greece by Pheidon 
 of Argos, it was probable that gold stood to silver in the 
 proportion of 15 : 1. For convenience, then, in Peloponnesus 
 and in Central Greece a system was adopted by which 10 
 pieces of silver were equivalent to one piece or ingot of gold. 
 This system, known as the Aeginetic, was thus otained. 
 
 Gold being to silver as 15:1, 
 
 1 gold ingot (Talanton) of 130 grs. x 15 = 1950 grs. of silver, 
 
 1950 grs. -H 10 = 195 grs. 
 
 Therefore 1 gold Talanton of 130 grs. = 10 pieces of silver 
 of 195 grs. each. 
 
 It is possible that this method of making 10 silver pieces 
 equal to one gold unit was developed at the time of the intro- 
 duction of coined money, but it is more likely that it may have 
 been in use even before that time. 
 
 Now it is worth observing that all through the classical 
 period of Greek history the term stater is generally confined 
 in use to gold pieces. Thus silver coins, unless they weighed 
 135 grs., are not described as silver staters, but are regularly 
 termed didrachms. So general evidently was this practice that 
 the adjective chrysous (xpvcrov^) was regularly employed to 
 express the gold unit, the masculine gender showing that 
 
 20—2 
 
S08 THE GREEK SYSTEM. 
 
 the noun understood is stater (a-raTijp). Thus Pollux says: 
 " Some were termed staters of Darius, some Philippeaus, other 
 Alexandrians, all being of gold, and if you say gold piece, 
 stater is understood : but if you should say stater, gold is not 
 absolutely to be understood'." From the fact that Pollux draws 
 attention to the exceptional use of stater to express a silver 
 coin, on the principle that exceptio probat regulam, it is evi- 
 dent that stater regularly represents a gold piece of two Attic 
 drachms. The familiar practice in Attic Greek, when speaking 
 of a considerable sum of silver without employing either the 
 term mina or talent, is to say 1000 drachms, 2000 drachms 
 and the like, but not 1000 staters or 2000 staters, etc., whilst 
 on the other hand, under like conditions, the practice is to 
 enumerate gold not by drachms, but by staters. Thus in a 
 fragment from the Demi of Eupolis quoted by Pollux" a man 
 is described as possessing 3000 staters of gold. We certainly 
 hear of an Aeginean stater and a Corinthian" stater (both of 
 silver), but both are found in writers of comparatively late date, 
 when usage was getting less exact, and besides, as the Aegi- 
 netic system had a separate individuality of its own, its unit 
 being perfectly different from the Euboic Attic, might with 
 justice be termed a stater. We are thus justified in con- 
 sidering the gold stater the legitimate descendant of the 
 Homeric Talanton, the stater or weigher representing the 
 Talanton or weight of the older time. As long as no other 
 unit than the ox-unit or Talanton was employed, the Talanton 
 or weight par excellence was sufficient to describe it, but when 
 under Asiatic influences the higher unit of the mina (fivd) 
 and talent were introduced, a term was substituted which in- 
 dicates clearly that the gold unit of 130 grs. was the weigher 
 or basis of the whole system. Starting then with our ox-unit, 
 we find already in Homer definite traces of a decimal, but 
 nothing to indicate the existence of a sexagesimal system. 
 Ten talents of gold are mentioned in several passages. 
 
 1 PoUux IX. 59. 
 
 ^ Pollux IX. 58 Sx'^" CTaTTJpas xpw/oi; rpiffxtKlovs. 
 
 » Thuc. (i. 27) speaks of Corinthian drachms not staters; and (v. 47) of 
 Aeginetic drachms. 
 
THE GREEK SYSTEM. 309 
 
 Starting then with the ox-unit of 130 grs. we can thus arrive 
 at the fully elaborated Greek systems. The term mina (yai/a) 
 is beyond doubt a borrowing from the East. How far it was 
 ever much employed in the reckoning of gold it is hard to say, 
 but it is at least remarkable that, when we hear so frequently of 
 minae of silver in the Attic writers, no instance of a mina of 
 gold is quoted in our books of reference. From this one is 
 led to infer that it was for the purpose of measuring the less 
 precious metal, silver, that the term mina was brought into use 
 in Greece. In fact, as stater is essentially a term which clings 
 to gold, so mina is especially a term used of silver. With the 
 mina the Greeks borrowed likewise the highest Asiatic unit (the 
 kikkar of the Hebrews), which became the Talanton or talent 
 of historical Greece. But it is remarkable that the Greeks 
 did not borrow its Asiatic name along with the unit itself. 
 They simply gave it their own name weight (literally, ' that 
 which can be lifted,' cp. rXdco, tollo, etc.). This fact can be 
 explained readily if we suppose that the Greeks, like all those 
 other primitive peoples whom we have mentioned, had a rough 
 and ready unit for estimating bulky wares, the standard of the 
 load, or as much as a man could conveniently carry on his back. 
 Having already such a unit they would have no difficulty in 
 adopting the load or talent, which had been fixed according to 
 the Sexagesimal system, and which had permeated all Western 
 Asia. In fact their position towards the Asiatic load, which had 
 been accurately fixed by the mathematical skill of the Babylo- 
 nians, would be exactly analagous to that of the Malays of Java 
 and Sumatra towards the accurately adjusted Chinese picul. 
 Because the Malays themselves were accustomed to use loads of 
 various weights as their rough highest unit of bulk, they have 
 with all the more readiness received the form of the same 
 unit, which tlie clever Chinese have incorporated into their 
 commercial weight system by making it equal to 100 chings 
 (catties, or pounds). But it is doubtful if at any time in Greece 
 Proper the talent of gold was ever considered as a monetary 
 unit. We have found Eupolis speaking of "3000 staters of 
 gold " instead of simply saying a talent of gold, and when we 
 do find mention made of talents of gold, as in a famous passage 
 
310 THE GREEK SYSTEM. 
 
 of Thucydides, where he describes the amount of gold em- 
 ployed by Pheidias in the making of the world-renowned 
 chryselephantine statue of Athena for the Parthenon, whilst the 
 computations in silver are expressed simply by talents, the gold 
 is enumerated as talents in weight. We may assume that gold 
 was weighed throughout Greece in historical times on the 
 following system : 
 
 1 stater =130grs. 
 50 staters = 1 mina =6500grs. 
 3000 „ = 60 minae = 1 talent = 390,000 grs. 
 
 When silver came into use it was probably weighed all 
 through Hellas, as in Asia and Egypt, on the same standard as 
 gold. This continued always to be the practice amongst the 
 great trading communities of Euboea, Chalcis and Eretria, and 
 their colonies, and also with Corinth and her daughter states. 
 Hence the system was commonly known as the Euboic, some- 
 times as the Corinthian, and in later times, for a reason to be 
 presently given, the Attic. But in this silver system it is no 
 longer the stater which represents the smaller unit, but rather 
 the drachm (Spa^ij). Furthermore we find in most constant 
 use a subdivision of the drachm called the obol (o/SoXd? nail or 
 spike), six of which made a drachm. There can be no doubt that 
 this silver obolos represented the value in silver of the ancient 
 copper unit from which it took its name, which itself was not 
 estimated by weight but probably, as we saw above, was simply 
 appraised by measure, as is done by all primitive peoples 
 in the estimation of copper and iron, nay even in the very 
 earliest stage of gold itself (p. 43). As six of these nails or 
 obols made a handful (Bpaxfi'V) in the ancient copper system, 
 so when each of them was equated to a certain amount of 
 silver, the equivalence in silver was called an obol, and the six 
 silver obols obtained the old name of handful or drachm. 
 In the ordinary Greek system of reckoning silver it is 100 
 drachms, not 50 staters, of silver which form the mina. But 
 of course at the earlier stages of the use of silver we may with 
 some boldness assume that silver was simply weighed by the 
 stater (or Homeric Talanton). 
 
THE GREEK SYSTEM. 311 
 
 It is important then to note that among the smaller weight 
 denominations silver has virtually no term peculiarly its own : 
 for we have seen that stater belongs essentially to gold, whilst 
 drachm and ohol have originated in the use of copper. This is 
 in complete harmony with what we know of the history of the 
 metals themselves, gold and copper being known and employed 
 long before men had learned to utilize silver; and so too, we 
 find the late-introduced term mina in especially close connec- 
 tion with the latest employed of the three metals. This 
 Euboic-Attic silver system maybe stated as follows : 
 
 6 obols = 1 drachm 
 100 drachms = 1 mina 
 60 minae = 1 talent. 
 
 The Corinthians, whilst making the ohol of the same weight 
 as the Euboic, made a different division of the silver stater ; for 
 as Corinth occupied the very portals of Peloponnesus where the 
 Aeginetic system was universal, she found it convenient for 
 purposes of exchange to divide her silver stater of 135 grs. into 
 three drachms of 45 grs. each, one of which was for practical 
 purposes identical with the Aeginetan half drachm. Thus two 
 Corinthian drachms of 45 grs. each were equal to one Aegi- 
 netan drachm of 90 grs. 
 
 The Aeginetan Standard. 
 
 The desire to obtain 10 silver pieces equivalent in value to 
 the gold ox-unit induced the Aeginetans, who were famous 
 merchantmen, to make a silver system distinct from that of 
 gold. Gold being to silver as 15:1, 
 
 130 X 15 = 1950 grs. of silver. 
 1950 -H 10= 195 grs. 
 
 With the Aeginetans as with the Euboeans in their silver 
 system, the ancient copper units of the vail and handful played 
 an important part. The story of Pheidon^ having hung up in 
 the temple of Hera at Argos the ancient currency of nails of 
 
 1 Cp. p. 214. 
 
312 THE GREEK SYSTEM. 
 
 copper and iron as soon as he struck his first issue of silver 
 coins, if not absolutely true in all details, at least contains a 
 most probable statement of what did actually take place when 
 a real silver currency was first introduced. We have seen 
 how the Chinese, starting with a barter currency of real hoes 
 and knives, the objects of most general demand, gradually 
 replaced those larger and more cumbrous articles by hoes and 
 knives of a more diminutive size, until finally they became a 
 real currency when they had been so reduced in size as to be 
 utterly unfit for practical use. We saw likewise how that at 
 the present moment the real hoe is the lowest unit of barter 
 among the wild tribes of Annam, and that small bars of iron of 
 given size are used in Laos, and that plates of metal ready to 
 be made into hoes, and hoes themselves, are employed by the 
 negroes of Central Africa, whilst on the west coast axes of a size 
 too diminutive for actual use are employed as a real currency. 
 As the day came when the Chinese finally replaced the archaic 
 knife by the full developed copper coin called the cash, so the 
 Aeginetans and Argives of the days of Pheidon superseded by a 
 real coin ancient monetary-units consisting either of real imple- 
 ments of iron and copper, or bars of those metals of certain 
 definite dimensions, or possibly mere Lilliputian representatives 
 of such, which had previously served them as a true currency. 
 On the whole however it is safest to assume from the names 
 nail (Obol) and Handful (drachme) that the form in which 
 copper or iron served as currency in Peloponnesus and the 
 mainland of Hellas in general was that of rods of a certain 
 length and thickness. We have cited already many analogous 
 forms from modern Asia and Africa, and from the ancient Kelts, 
 to which we shall presently add the ancient Italians. But just 
 as we found that in the Soudan, whilst the slave and ox 
 were universally the higher units of value, each particular 
 district had its own distinctive lower unit according to the 
 nature of its products and requirements, so it is most likely 
 that there were many different units of value (but all alike sub- 
 multiples of the cow) in use among the various Greek com- 
 munities. It is also probable that they must have exercised 
 a certain effect in the formation of the units of silver currency. 
 
THE GREEK SYSTEM. 313 
 
 Nor is evidence wanting for this. I have already maintained 
 (p. .5) that the fact of the occurrence of the type of the cow, 
 or cow's head, on early Greek coins is evidence that the original 
 monetary unit was the ox. Thus we find the forepart of an ox 
 on the early electrum staters of Samos of the Phoenician 
 standard (217 grs.), which was probably equivalent to a pure 
 gold ox-unit of 130 grs. The bull's head also appears on 
 the electrum coins of Eretria and of other places in Euboea. 
 But it is with the silver currency that we are now especially 
 concerned. Whilst it was extremely likely that silver coins 
 might in process of time bear the impress of an ox, the 
 general unit of currencj'^, it was still more natural that, as 
 pieces of silver supplanted as units not the ox but its sub- 
 multiples, that is the particular series of articles of barter in 
 use in any particular district, so these silver coins should bear 
 some traces in their types of the ancient units thus sup- 
 planted. That eminent scholar Colonel Leake many years ago 
 remarked that the types of Greek coins generally related " to 
 the local mythology and fortunes of the place, with symbols 
 referring to the principal productions or to the protecting 
 numina." 
 
 Modern scholars have more and more lost sight of the 
 doctrine contained in the words which I have italicized, and 
 directed all their efforts to giving a religious signification to 
 everything ^ The forepart of the Lion and the Bull on the 
 coins of Lydia become symbols of the Sun and Moon, the 
 Tortoise on the didrachm of Aegina is regarded as a symbol of 
 
 Fig. 31. Coin of Cyrene with Silphium plant. 
 
 Aphrodite, the Ashtaroth of the Phoenicians, in her capacity of 
 
 patron divinity of traders ; even the silphium plant of Cyrene, 
 
 1 P. Gardner, Types of Greek Coins, passim. 
 
314 THE GREEK SYSTEM. 
 
 which yielded a salubrious but somewhat unpleasant medicine, 
 is regarded not as holding its place on the coins of Gyrene and 
 its sister towns because it formed the chief staple of trade, but 
 because forsooth it may have been the symbol of Aristaeus, 
 " the protector of the corn-field and the vine and all growing 
 crops, and bees and flocks and shepherds, and the averter of the 
 scorching blasts of the Sahara." There is probably just as 
 mucTi evidence for this as there is for believing that the beaver 
 on some Canadian coins and stamps is symbolical of St 
 Lawrence, after whom the great Canadian river is named, the 
 warm skin of the beaver indicating that the saint of the red- 
 hot gridiron is the averter of the cruel and biting blasts that 
 sweep down from the icy North. I do not for a moment mean 
 that mythological and religious subjects do not play their 
 proper part in Greek coin types. But it is just as wrong to 
 reduce all coin types to this category as it would be to regard 
 them all as merely symbolic of the natural and manufactured 
 products of the various states. If however we can show that 
 certain coins, even in historical times, were regarded as the 
 representations of the objects of barter of more primitive 
 times, we shall have established a firm basis from which to 
 make further advances. 
 
 In those now famous Cretan inscriptions found at Gortyn' 
 certain sums are counted by kettles (lehetes, 'Ki^r]Te<;) and pots 
 {tripods, TptTToSey). Some have thought that these are the same 
 objects which are called staters in later forms of the same docu- 
 ments. But recently M. Svoronos' has advanced a very plausible 
 hypothesis that the lehetes and tripods of the inscriptions 
 really refer not to an actual currency in the kettles and pots of 
 the old Homeric times, but to certain Cretan coins which are 
 countermarked with a stamp, which he recognizes in many ex- 
 amples as a lehes, and in at least one case as a tripod. Whether 
 the first hypothesis, that actual kettles and pots were indicated 
 
 1 Comparetti, Leggi antiche della citta di Gortyna in Creta, 1885 ; Museo 
 Italiano ii. 195, no. 39 : iUd. ii. 222. Roberts, Greek Epigraphy, p. 53. 
 
 ^ Bulktin de Gorrespondance HelUnique, 1888, p. 405 seqq. (where he gives 
 an engraving of a stater so countermarked). Mr B. V. Head (Numism. Ghron. 
 3rd ser. ix. 242) in a notice of this paper lends his great authority to the sup- 
 port of Svoronos' view. 
 
THE GREEK SYSTEM. 315 
 
 in the earlier inscriptions and that they had been replaced after- 
 wards by coins, or the hypothesis of M. Svoronos, be true, is im- 
 material for us. In either case there is evidence of a direct and 
 unbroken succession which connects the silver currency of Crete 
 with an earlier currency of manufactured articles. The very fact 
 that a lebes or a tripod stamped upon a coin gave it currency, 
 not merely in the town of issue but among neighbouring states, 
 indicates that in a previous age the common unit of currency 
 corresponding in value to the coin so marked was an actual 
 lebes or tripod. Such is the evidence preserved for us in this 
 remote corner of Hellas where life moved slowly, and where 
 the archaic style of writing known as boustrophedon (the lines 
 going from right to left and left to right alternately, as the 
 plough turns up and down the field) still lingered on long after 
 it had disappeared from every spot on the mainland of Greece. 
 If then amongst the symbols which appear on the earliest coins 
 of Greek communities, which began very early to strike money, 
 we can find some which have not been identified as religions, 
 and which we can show represent objects which actually did 
 or may well have formed a monetary unit in such places, we 
 shall have advanced a step further; and if we succeed in 
 making good this fresh position, we may in turn find a non- 
 religious explanation for certain types, which at present are re- 
 garded as mythological symbols. 
 
 The types with which we shall deal must be those found on 
 the most archaic coins, and which therefore date from a time 
 when barter was just being replaced by a monetary currency. 
 Thus in the case of cities like Athens and Corinth, which began 
 to coin at a comparatively late period and which had been long 
 accustomed to use the issues of other states before they struck 
 money of their own, we should hardly expect to find any trace 
 of the old local barter-unit in their coin types, as such a unit 
 had long since been replaced by the foreign coins. 
 
 Let us first turn to the well-known type of the tunny fish 
 
 (iTTjXa/jLV'i, 6vvvo<;), vast shoals of which were continually passing 
 
 through the sea of Marmora (Propontis) from the Black Sea to 
 
 the Mediterranean'. This type appears invariably upon the 
 
 1 Head, op. cit. 450, who quotes Marquardt's Gyzicus, p. 45. 
 
816 THE GREEK SYSTEM. 
 
 electrum coins of Cyzicus, and a tunny's head is found upon 
 some very archaic silver coins from the Santorin ' find ' which 
 Mr Head places at the top of the whole Cyzicene series, but no 
 one has, as far as I am aware, yet hitherto attempted to 
 mythologize it^ although the fecundity of this fish would 
 make it just as suitable an emblem for Aphrodite as the 
 " lascivious turtle," and the traders of Cyzicus might quite as 
 well wear the badge of the goddess of the sea as the merchants 
 of Aegina, for there is just as much or just as little evidence for 
 Phoenician influences at Cyzicus as there is at Aegina. From 
 what we have learned in an earlier chapter we know that the 
 articles which form the staple commodities of a community in 
 the age of barter virtually form its money. In a city like Cyzi- 
 cus whose citizens depended for their wealth on their fisheries 
 and trade, rather than on flocks or herds and agriculture, the 
 tunny fish singly or in certain defined numbers, as by the score 
 
 Fig. 32. Coin of Cyzicus with tunny fish. 
 
 or hundred and the like, would naturally form a chief monetary 
 unit, just as we found the stock fish employed in mediaeval 
 Iceland. Are we not then justified in considering the tunny 
 fish, which forms the invariable adjunct of the coins of Cyzicus, 
 as an indication that these coins superseded a primitive system 
 in which the tunny formed a monetary unit, just as the Kettle 
 and Pot counter-marks on the coins of Crete point back to the 
 days when real kettles formed the chief medium of exchange ? 
 But far stronger evidence is at hand to show that the tunny 
 fish was used as a monetary unit in some parts of Hellas. We 
 have had occasion to refer to the city of Olbia which lay on 
 the north shore of the Black Sea. It was a Milesian colony, 
 
 1 Fishermen offered to Poseidon the first tunny they caught (Athen. p. 346), 
 but this was simply an offering of first fruits and not because the tunny 
 was sacred. 
 
THE GREEK SYSTEM. 817 
 
 and was the chief Greek emporium in this region. There 
 are bronze coins of this city made in the shape of fishes, and 
 
 Fig. 33. Coins of Olbia iu the form of tunny fish. 
 
 inscribed @T, which has been identified as the abbrevia- 
 tion of 6vvvo<;, tunny. Others are inscribed APIXO, which 
 Koehler read as rdpt.'x^o';, salt fish, but which the distin- 
 guished German numismatist Von Sallet' regards as meaning a 
 basket (dppfx^oi;). He holds those marked 0T as the legal 
 price of a tunny fish, those marked APIXO as that of a basket 
 of fish^ When we recall the Chinese bronze cowries, the 
 Burmese silver shells, the silver fish-hooks of the Indian Ocean, 
 the little hoes and knives of China, and the miniature axes 
 from Africa, we are constrained to believe that in those coins of 
 Olbia, shaped like a fish, we have a distinct proof of the in- 
 fluence on the Greek mind of the same principle which has 
 impelled other peoples to imitate in metal the older object of 
 barter which a metal currency is replacing. The inhabitants of 
 Olbia were largely intermixed with the surrounding barbarians, 
 and may therefore have felt some difficulty in replacing their 
 barter unit by a round piece of metal bearing merely the 
 imprint of a fish, while the pure-blooded Greek of Cyzicus had 
 no hesitation in mentally bridging the gulf between a real 
 fish and a piece of metal merely stamped with a fish, and did 
 not require the intermediate step of first shaping his metal unit 
 into the form of a tunny. We shall find that this tendency to 
 shape metal into the form of the object which it supplants may 
 perhaps be traced in the coins of Aegina and Boeotia. 
 
 In the same quarter of Hellas we find another instance of a 
 coin type which may be regarded as evidence that the silver 
 coin which bears it was the representative of an older barter 
 
 ' Zeitschrift f. Numismatik, x. \Hseqq. 
 
 2 The tunny is a very lai;ge fish, usually four feet long, and is hardly Ukely 
 to have been sold by the basketful. 
 
318 THE GREEK SYSTEM. 
 
 unit. The island of Tenedos, lying off the Troad, struck at a 
 very early date silver coins bearing for device a double-headed 
 
 Fig. 34. Coin of Tenedos with double-headed axe. 
 
 axe (the Latin hipennis). This " Axe of Tenedos " (Tei'eSto? 
 irekeKvi) was explained by Aristotle' as a reference to a decree 
 of a king of Tenedos which enacted that all who were convicted 
 of adultery should be put to death. This explanation is pro- 
 bably a bit of mere aetiology to explain the existence of an 
 emblem, the true origin of which had been forgotten. However, 
 it yields one important result, for it shows that the emblem was 
 not religious. Had that been its nature, priestly conservatism 
 would have kept an unbroken tradition of its origin. But from 
 another source some light may be obtained: Pausanias" in the 
 2nd century A.D. saw at Delphi axes dedicated according to 
 tradition by Periclytus of Tenedos, and then proceeds to relate 
 the following tale : Tennes, an old King of Tenedos about the 
 time of the Trojan War, cut with an axe the ropes withv 
 which his father Cycnus had moored his ship to the shore, 
 when he came to ask pardon of Tennes for having cast him 
 and his sister in a chest into the sea, in a fit of anger caused 
 by the false accusation of a stepmother. We may gather that 
 according to this form of the legend the Janiform head, male 
 and female, on the obverse of the coins of Tenedos alludes to 
 the brother and sister. But Pausanias makes no attempt to 
 connect Periclytus in any way with Tennes except as being 
 a native of Tenedos. This is hardly enough to account for 
 the dedication of the axes at Delphi. Two explanations sug- 
 gest themselves. It was the custom of kings or communities 
 to send offerings to Delphi of the best products of their land. 
 Thus Croesus sent vast quantities of his Lydian electrum, and, 
 
 ' Apud Stephamtm Byxant. s. v. T^veSos. 
 ^ i. 14. 1. 
 
THE GREEK SYSTEM. 319 
 
 still more to the point, the people of Metapoutum in South 
 Italy, whose land was famous for its wheat, after an especially 
 favourable harvest sent to Delphi a wheat-ear (Oepo'i) of gold. 
 Were the double axes in like fashion an especial product of 
 Tenedos ? Or was this dedication analogous to that of Pheidon 
 when he hung up in the temple of the Argive Here the ancient 
 nails and bars ? The first explanation is the more probable, 
 for there was no reason why the Tenedians should not have 
 dedicated their cast off currency of axes in some temple at 
 home. I have already mentioned the hoe currency of ancient 
 China, and the axes used as such in Africa. I shall now 
 show that such double-axes as those stamped on the coins of 
 Tenedos formed part of the earliest Greek system of currency. 
 I have already enumerated the various articles used in barter in 
 the Homeric poems. The prizes offered in the Funeral games of 
 Patroclus are of course merely the usual objects of barter and 
 currency, slavewomen, oxen, lebetes, tripods, talents of gold and 
 the like. " But he (Achilles) set for the archers dark iron, and 
 he set down ten axes (7r6Xe«6a9), and ten half-axes {■fifiiire- 
 \eKKa)\" The axe is undoubtedly of the same kind as that on 
 the coins of Tenedos, the name (pelekys) being the same in 
 each case, and the Homeric one beyond doubt is double-headed 
 like the Tenedian, since the half-axe (hemi-pelekkon) must 
 obviously mean a single-headed axe^. The double-axes formed 
 the first prize, the ten half-axes the second, for " Meriones took 
 up all the ten axes, and Teucer bore the ten half-axes to the 
 hollow ships"." These axes and half-axes then seem to go in 
 groups of ten as units of value, the half-axes representing half 
 
 1 Iliad, XXIII. 850 — 1, 
 
 Airap 6 ToleuT-gcri HBn loevra alSiipov, 
 
 KotS S' eTlBa SiKa /nev TreW/ceaj, S&a 8' i)fuwi\eKKa. 
 
 '^ No doubt the axe was often used as a religious emblem ; double-headed 
 axes borne in procession are seen on Hittite sculptures (Perrot et Chipiez, His- 
 toire de I'Art dans I'antiquite, iv. p. 637). It was also the symbol of Dionysus 
 at Pagasae. So amongst the Polynesians we find processional axes as well as 
 real ones like our sword of state as contrasted with real swords. 
 3 lb. 882—3, 
 
 av S' apa W.7ipt6vr]S ireXiKeas SiKa irdnTas aeipEK, 
 Teufcpos d' r)pnri\eKKa (pipiv KoCXas iiri v^as. 
 
320 THE GREEK SYSTEM. 
 
 the value of the double-headed. If then the kettle and tripod 
 of Homeric times are found as symbols on the coins of Crete, 
 why may not the axe on those of Teaedos represent the local 
 unit of an earlier epoch ? and that such axes were evidently an 
 important article in Tenedos is proved by the dedication at 
 Delphi. 
 
 But could we only find a contemporary description of the 
 type on one of the earliest coins of Asia Minor, the cradle of the 
 art of coining, we might get our ideas on the nature of the 
 coin types greatly cleared. Fortunately such an opportunity is 
 afforded to us by an unique coin in the British Museum, the 
 oldest as yet known which bears an inscription. It is an oblong 
 electrum coin (Fig. 35), the reverse having the usual incuse, 
 but on its obverse it bears a stag feeding, and over it runs 
 
 Fig. 35. Coin of Phanes (earliest known inscribed coin). 
 
 (retrograde) in archaic letters i AM THE mark OF phanes (^avo<; 
 e/it cre/Lta = <t>ai/ov? eifil a-fjfj,a). There can be no doubt that 
 the mark of Phanes is the stag. If there was no inscription 
 it would have been at once asserted that the stag was the 
 symbol of the goddess Artemis, and who could deny it ? 
 But as it stands it is plain that the stag is nothing more than 
 the particular badge adopted by the potentate Phanes, when 
 and where he may have reigned, as a guarantee of the weight 
 of the coin and perhaps the purity of the metal. The Daric 
 itself needs no inscription to tell us that its type is not religious. 
 The figure of the Great King with his spear and bow and quiver 
 can hardly be allegorized even by an Origen '. Emboldened by 
 these instances we may even hold up our hands against the host 
 of Heaven, and raise doubts as to whether the foreparts of the 
 
 1 Although Mr Frazer (Golden Bough, i. 8) has given abundant evidence to 
 show that Icings were in some places worshipped as gods, no one can maintain 
 that the Persians, who were Moroastrians, would have treated their king as 
 a god. 
 
THE GREEK SYSTEM. 321 
 
 lion and bull upon the coins of Lydia represent the Sun-god 
 and the Moon -goddess. May not the lion simply be the royal 
 emblem ? I have already suggested this explanation for the 
 lion weights of Assyria. Undoubtedly from the earliest times 
 the king of beasts (as in Aesop's Fables) was regarded in the 
 East as the true badge of royalty. " The Lion of the tribe of 
 Judah " is familiar to us all, and it is more rational to regard 
 the lions which guarded the steps of Solomon's throne as 
 emblems of kingship rather than as symbols of the Sun. Is 
 then the Lion on the coins of Lydia nothing more than the 
 king's badge, just as the stag is the badge of Phanes ? But 
 what about the bull or cow? Shall I go too far if I regard it 
 as indicating that the coin is the ox-unit ? When the Greeks 
 
 Fig. 36. Archaic coin of Samos. 
 
 borrowed the art of coining from Lydia it is easy to understand 
 that they would likewise borrow the type either in a complete 
 or modified form, and hence it is that we find the lion or 
 lion's head on the coins of Miletus', the lion's scalp on those of 
 Samos (on which the cow's head also is found), the lion's head 
 on the coins of Cnidus, of Gortyn in Crete, at Rhodes, at Mi- 
 
 FiG. 37. Coin of Cnidus. 
 
 letus, and at the Phocaean towns of Velia in Lucania, and 
 Massalia in Gaul, and put by the Samian exiles on their coins 
 at Zancle. If the Greeks had been barbarians they would have 
 
 ^ The eleetrum coins with the lion's head with open jaws formerly ascribed 
 to Miletus are now assigned to the Lydian king Alyattes by M. J. P. Six, Num. 
 Chron. N. S. Vol. x. 185 seqq. (1890). 
 
 K. 21 
 
322 THE GREEK §■? STEM. 
 
 slavishly copied the lion coins of Lydia, just as the Gauls copied 
 the lion of Massalia, and at a later time the stater of Philip, and 
 as the Himyarites of South Arabia, the " owls " of Athens', and 
 as in mediaeval times the Danes of Dublin copied the corns of 
 the Saxon kings'. But the artistic genius of the Greeks could 
 submit to no such trammels, and the lion type was varied and 
 diversified according to the fancy of each community. The same 
 holds good of the type of the cow and cow's head. The Greek 
 genius gave us these beautiful types such as the cow suckling her 
 calf (Dyrrachium), the cow with the bird on her back (Eretria), 
 the cow scratching herself (Eretria), the two calves' heads seen 
 on the coins of Mytilene, and the magnificent charging bull on 
 the coins of Thurii. The cow or bull's head on the early gold and 
 
 Fig. 38. Coin of Thurii. 
 
 electrum coins was the indication of the value. In later times 
 when the connection between ox and coin was only traditional, 
 the ox was put on coins simply as symbolical of money. 
 
 Again Phocaea, one of the very earliest Greek towns to 
 issue coins, employed a symbol which cannot be termed re- 
 ligious. Her coins bear a seal (phoca) a type parlant referring 
 to the name of the town. Many examples of the same kind 
 
 Fig. 39. Coin of Ehoda in Spain. 
 
 can be quoted, the rose (poBov) on the coins of Rhodes ('PoSo?) 
 and also on those of Rhoda in Spain, the bee (melitta) on those 
 
 1 Head, Op. cit. 6. 88. 
 
 " Lindsay, Survey of the Coinage of Ireland, p. 6 sejj. 
 
THE GREEK SYSTEM. 323 
 
 of Melitaea, perhaps even the owl (xaXKt,-;) on coins ascribed to 
 Chalcis in Euboea. These considerations will serve to show 
 that we may expect many things on coins besides religious 
 symbols. Thasos was famous for its wine, and accordingly the 
 wine-cup is a regular adjunct of its coins, either standing alone, 
 or held in the hands of old Silenus, who quaffs therefrom a 
 "draught of vintage that hath been cooled a long age in the 
 deep-delved earth." All who have read Horace remember the 
 fame of the wines of Chios, and accordingly the wine-jar is a 
 regular adjunct of the mintage of that island. Now there is 
 proof that the trade in wine was of extreme antiquity, if not 
 in the islands just mentioned, at least in Lemnos, and that 
 that trade was carried on by barter, for we read in Homer 
 how " many ships stood in from Lemnos bringing wine, which 
 Euneos the son of Jason had sent forward, whom Hypsipyle 
 had borne to Jason shepherd of the folk, but separately for the 
 sons of Atreus, Agamemnon and Menelaus, the son of Jason 
 gave wine to be fetched, a thousand measures. From thence 
 used the flowing-haired Achaeans to buy their wine, some with 
 copper, some with glittering iron, some with hides, others 
 with the kine themselves, others again with slaves'." From 
 what we have seen in an earlier chapter it is clear that a 
 measure of wine would have a known value in relation to the 
 various articles here enumerated. Thus in North America 
 where the beaver skin was the unit, a gallon of brandy = 6 
 skins, a brass kettle = 1 skin, an ounce of vermilion = 1 skin 
 and so on^. In other words, the ordinary currency with 
 which the Lemnians would purchase wares from other people 
 who had no wine of their own would be wine, the unit of 
 which was the measure (which elsewhere I have tried to 
 show was the cup Seira<;, Smith's Diet. Antiq. s.v. Mensura). 
 This measure would be the size of the vessel ordinarily em- 
 ployed for wine, probably much the same as the two-handled 
 vase out of which Silenus is seen drinking on coins of Thasos. 
 
 With the introduction of silver currency nothing is more 
 likely than that an effort would be made to equate the new 
 
 1 II. VII. 468 seqq. 
 
 " A. Dobbs, Account of Hudson's Bay (1744). 
 
 21—2 
 
324 THE GREEK SYSTEM. 
 
 silver unit to that which had formed the principal unit of 
 barter. That the earliest types should indicate the object (or 
 its value) which the coin replaced is in complete accord with 
 the statement of Aristotle (quoted on an earlier page) that 
 "the stamp was put on the coin as an indication of value'." 
 As no numerals appear on the early Greek coins, it is evident 
 that Aristotle regarded the symbol, whether ox-head, or tunny, 
 or shield, as the index of the value. If it be said that the 
 putting of a cow, or axe, or tunny on a coin was simply a 
 picturesque way of indicating a single unit, we may reply that 
 it is far easier to understand why a certain people chose a par- 
 ticular symbol, if in their minds the object symbolized was 
 identified with the value of the silver or gold coin. It is at all 
 events certain that Aristotle did not regard the t3rpe as 
 religious in origin. But we are not without actual evidence 
 that such an equating of the silver unit to the barter-unit 
 really took place in Greece. It is held by the best numis- 
 matists that Solon was the first to coin money at Athens. It 
 is also well known that the highest class in his constitution, 
 called Pentacosiomedimni {Five-hundred-measure-men), were 
 rated at 500 drachms. Thus the Olympic victor received 500 
 drachms to qualify him to be a Five-hundred-measure-man''. 
 Furthermore Plutarch distinctly tells us that Solon reckoned a 
 drachm as equivalent to a measure' or a sheep. It is hardly 
 possible to doubt that the first Attic coined silver drachm was 
 equated to the old barter unit of a measure (either of corn or 
 oil). The same may be said in reference to the olive sprig which 
 from the earliest issue is found on the coins of Athens. The 
 sacred olive-trees {fioplau) which belonged to the state, and 
 for the care of which special officials were appointed, and 
 even the very stumps of which, and the spot on which they 
 had grown, were under a taboo'', were a source of considerable 
 
 1 Politics II. 1257 E 6 yhp xi^P^-i^TTip Mdi) toO v6a-ov (Trui^Xov. 
 
 ' Plutarch, Solon 18. 
 
 ' Ibid. 23 Bis iiiv ye to Tiii-qixara t&v Bmidv Xoyli^erai irpb^aTOv koX Spaxwqv 
 avrl iJ.eSLp.vov Tip d"'la-6p,ia vi.Kwavn 5paxp.as kra^ev ixarbv Sldoa-ffai., rip 5' '0\up.Ti.a 
 wevraKoalas' 'KiKov Si Tip Kop.laavn irlvre Spaxp.as iSoiKe, \vKiS4a Si pXav, uv ^'r](T(.v 
 iaXripeiis Arjp.'fp-pios ri piv /3o6s elvai., tS Si wpo^drov Ti/iijc. 
 
 * Lysias, de Sacra oliva, 6. 
 
THE GREEK SYSTEM. 325 
 
 revenue to the state in the 6th century B.C. The fact that 
 they were all supposed to be scions of the sacred olive-tree 
 on the Acropolis, which was itself supposed to be the gift of 
 
 Fig. 40. Tetradraohm of Athens. 
 
 Athena, and the religious care bestowed on them, puts it 
 beyond doubt that the olive at an early date formed one of 
 the most important products of Attica. The instances given 
 already of the employment of various kinds of food as money 
 are sufficient to show that there is nothing far-fetched in sup- 
 posing that olives and olive-oil may have been so employed at 
 Athens. 
 
 We have already spoken of the silphium or laserpitium plant 
 on the coins of Gyrene, Barca, Euesperides and Teuchira, and 
 mentioned the interpretation which makes it the symbol of 
 the hero Aristaeus. It seems however far more reasonable to 
 treat it on the same principle as the others just discussed. 
 The silphium formed the most important article produced in 
 that region, and it is perfectly in accordance with all analogy 
 that certain quantities of this plant and of the juice extracted 
 from it should be employed as money. We saw above that 
 at the present moment tea is so employed on the borders of 
 Tibet and China, and raw cotton in Darfur. But there is also 
 some positive evidence in favour of this assumption, for Strabo^ 
 tell us that a traffic was carried on at the port of Charax 
 between the Carthaginians and Cyrenaeans, the former bringing 
 wine wherewith to purchase the silphium of the latter. There 
 must have been a wine-unit, and also an unit for the silphium, 
 or otherwise the barter could not have been carried on; and 
 just as in Gaul° a jar of wine purchased a boy fit to serve 
 
 1 Strabo, xvii. 836. 
 
 " Diodorus Siculus v. 26. 2 Siddvres yap tov olvov Kepdfuov dvTiXa/M^Avovn 
 irarSa ktX. 
 
326 THE GREEK SYSTEM. 
 
 as a cupbearer, a certain measure of wine being equated 
 to a slave-boy, so we may conclude that some such wine-unit 
 was equated to a packet or bale of silphium, the latter in 
 turn having a certain amount of silver equated to it, which 
 when coinage was introduced was stamped with the silphium 
 device. That the silphium was packed in bales of a fixed 
 weight is proved by a now famous vase-painting which repre- 
 
 FiQ. 41. Vase from Cyrene, shewing the weighing of the Silphium. 
 
 sents the weighing (on ship board ?) of the bales of silphium 
 in the presence of Arcesilas the king of Cyrene'. The figure 
 who points to the scales is marked sliphiomachos (aXi^io- 
 1 Baumeister, Denkmaler, s.v. Silphium. Studioyna, Kyrene, p. 22. Birch 
 Amient Pottery (frontispiece). The vase is in the Paris Biblioth'sque. " 
 
THE GREEK SYSTEM. 327 
 
 /*«%o?) which is taken to mean silphiwrn-weigher (a-Xi^io- being 
 either a mis-spelling of the artist, or the local form of the 
 word, whilst the latter part is connected with the Egyptian 
 mach = to weigh). Close to the silphium packets is the word 
 MAEN, which has not been explained, but which may be simply 
 a form of the word mina {manah, meneh) and denotes that each 
 packet weighed that amount. 
 
 Fig. 42. Coin of Metapontum. 
 
 The ear of corn (wheat) on the coins of Metapontum', an old 
 Achaean colony in Magna Graecia, is explained by modern 
 writers as a symbol of Demeter : but the story told by Strabo 
 of how the early settlers dedicated a golden ear at Delphi 
 because they had amassed such great wealth from agriculture, 
 indicates a far simpler solution, that the chief product and 
 chief article of barter of Metapontum was naturally placed on 
 her coins. As the tunny adorns the coins of Cyzicus, so we find 
 the cuttle-fish on the coins of Croton and Eretria, As this 
 creature was devoured with great gusto by the ancients, as 
 it is at the present day at Naples and in Palestine, there is 
 
 1 The only evidence to show that Demeter was worshipped at Metapontum 
 is that a female head on certain of her coins is accompanied by the legend 
 SuTj/pia. It has been inferred that this is an epithet of Demeter, but this is 
 most unlikely, for in that case we should expect Siireipa, as on the coins of 
 Hipponium, Syracuse, Agrigentum, Coroyra, Cyzicus, and Apamea, not 'Siiarripla, 
 as the adjective. Thus we always find Zeis Inar'^p, not Swt-^/jios: cf. Siireipo 
 Buco/ifo, Pind. 01. ix. 16, Stireipo Ttfxa. 01. xii. 2, Xdn-apa Q^/iis, 01. viil. 21. 
 'S.uiTTipla is rather Safety (Lat. Salus), who, as my friend Mr J. G. Frazer points 
 out to me, was worshipped at Patrae and Aegeum, two of the chief towns of 
 Achaea (Pausan. vii. 21. 7; vri. 24. 3). We also find such names of divinities 
 a.s'tyi.da, '0/x6»oia and TSUa on the coins of Metapontum. As Metapontum was 
 an Achaean colony, it is likely that Salus was worshipped there also. Besides 
 it was to Apollo, and not to Demeter, that they dedicated their golden ear as a 
 harvest thank-offering. Qipos is the ear cut from the stalk after the ancient way 
 of reaping, cf. 0ipii aTaxtioiv, Plut. 
 
328 THE GREEK SYSTEM. 
 
 no necessity to regard it as a symbol of Poseidon, or of treating 
 it in any way different from the tunny. 
 
 Fig. 43. Coin of Croton with outtle fish. 
 
 I now come to two most important types, the Tortoise of 
 Aegina, and the Shield of Boeotia. I have already mentioned the 
 
 Pig. 44. 'Tortoise' of Aegina. 
 
 symbolic interpretation given by E. Curtius to the former. That 
 various natural productions, such as gourds, cocoa-nuts, joints of 
 bamboo, served and still serve as vessels and measures of capacity 
 in various countries we have seen already, and we likewise found 
 that in the ancient Chinese monetary system of shells the shell 
 of the tortoise stood at the top as the unit of highest value, and 
 that down to a comparatively late epoch it was still highly 
 prized in Cochin China for making bowls of great beauty. In 
 both Greek and Latin there is abundant evidence to show that 
 the functions which in a later time were performed by pottery 
 were discharged by natural shells at an earlier period. Thus, 
 if we do not find any actual vessel called a chelSne (tortoise) 
 in use amongst the Greeks, we at least find one called a Sea- 
 urchin (Echinus, ix^vo'i): for not only was the shell of this 
 creature used as a vessel for containing medicines and the 
 like, but vessels of artificial construction of the same shape 
 and name were actually employed ; thus the casket in which 
 were deposited and sealed up the documents produced at the 
 preliminary hearing of an Athenian lawsuit was called an Echi- 
 nus. There was likewise a small vessel called conch6 (Koyyrj), 
 
THE GREEK SYSTEM. 329 
 
 after the shell-fish of that name, the Latin concha, whilst a 
 cognate name, conchylion, was applied to the case placed over 
 the seals of wills. 
 
 Nay, ostrakon, the common word for a potsherd, familiar 
 to us from its famous derivative Ostracism, or Voting hy Pot- 
 sherds, so called because the people inscribed their votes on 
 pieces of pottery, meant originally nothing more than an oyster 
 shell. In Latin testa,, the ordinary name for an earthenware 
 vessel, means nothing more than the covering of a shell-fish, 
 and from this word testudo, the Latin name for the tortoise, is 
 simply a derivative. Such instances could be multiplied if it 
 were necessary, but those mentioned are sufficient to show the 
 high probability of so valuable a shell as that of the tortoise 
 having been employed. Owing to its beauty it would prob- 
 ably hold its place in Greece as the choicest kind of vessel for 
 centuries after the art of pottery was known, just as it did in 
 Cochin China. It would be only when the art of glazing and 
 embellishing pottery had made some progress that vessels of 
 baked clay could compete with the lustrous, many-hued shell. 
 Nor are we without some direct evidence for the use of tor- 
 toise shell among the Greeks. The famous story of the in- 
 vention of the 130-6 by the god Hermes is not without sig- 
 nificance. According to the Hymn to Hermes, "the precocious 
 divinity on the very day of his birth sallied forth and found a 
 tortoise feeding on the luxuriant grass in front of the palace, 
 as it moved with straddling gait." His eye was caught by the 
 dappled shell (aloXov oarpaKov), and carrying home his spoil, 
 he made of it a lyre. The legend which thus explains why 
 the sounding-board of the lyre is so called points back to a 
 time when the best form of bowl or hollow vessel for making 
 a sounding board for a musical instrument was that afforded 
 by the shell which was probably one of the common articles 
 of everyday life. 
 
 But, in addition to all this indirect evidence, we are able to 
 point to actual Greek vessels made of earthenware, fashioned in 
 the shape of a tortoise. In the second Vase Room of the British 
 Museum (case 48 and 49) there are two terra cotta vases from 
 the island of Melos, wrought in the shape of this creature, and 
 
330 THE GREEK SYSTEM. 
 
 with these before us it is hardly possible to regard as other than 
 wooden bowls carved in the shape of the same animal the wooden 
 tortoises with which the Thessalian women pounded to death 
 Lais the famous courtezan, in the temple of Aphrodite, after she 
 had taken up her residence in their country'. We can parallel 
 this development of artificial vessels of wood and earthenware 
 from the use of the actual shell in modern times. Lady Brassey 
 saw in the Museum at Honolulu, amongst the ancient native 
 weapons and swords, "tortoise-shell cups and spoons, cala- 
 bashes and bowls'." Now in the Cambridge Ethnological 
 Museum there is a very fine wooden bowl from the South 
 Seas, carved in the shape of a tortoise, and also earthenware 
 vessels in the shape of tortoises from Fiji, which shows that the 
 islanders of the Pacific not only used the real shells for vessels, 
 but likewise imitated them in wood'. 
 
 On an earlier page I quoted the statement of Ephorus that 
 the Aeginetans took to commerce on account of the barrenness 
 of their island. But they must have had something to give in 
 exchange to other people before they could have developed a 
 carrying trade, and as the island had been the resort of mer- 
 chants from very early days, it must have had something to 
 attract strangers as well as its position. Let us take the case 
 of an island with barren soil in modern days, and see what it 
 has to export. Thus Dhalac Island in the Red Sea is fre- 
 quented by the Banyan merchants for the sake of its pearls, 
 and at Massowah tortoise-shell forms an important article of 
 commerce. Just as the Banyans come to Dhalac*, so the 
 Phoenicians probably came to Aegina, searching for the murex 
 
 1 Athenaeua xiii. p. 589 ab ; Sehol. on Aiistophanes, Plutus, 179 ; Suidas, 
 
 S.V. Xc\livTf. 
 
 2 Voyage of the Sunbeam, p. 276 (London, 1880). [L.M.E.] 
 
 " We learn from Strabo, 773, that the Greeks were familiar with the em- 
 ployment of tortoise shells, for a tribe called Tortoise-eaters on the north coast 
 of Africa used the shells of these animals, which were of large size, for roofing 
 purposes. Pausanias (vm. 23. 9) tells us that there were large tortoises well 
 suited for making lyres in Arcadia, but the people would not touch them as they 
 were under the protection of Pan. As Pan was lord of the forest and mountain, 
 the tortoise being especially large would naturally be regarded as his special 
 property. 
 
 ^ Mansfield Parkyn, Abyssinia, Vol. i. p. 407. 
 
THE GREEK SYSTEM. 331 
 
 (purple fish) and tortoise. No doubt tortoise-shell must have 
 been the chief article of export from Tortoise Island, described 
 by Strabo (773), as situated in the Arabian Gulf (Red Sea). 
 
 The foregoing considerations make it not at all improbable 
 that the tortoise on the coins of Aegina simply indicates that 
 the old monetary unit of that island was the shell of the sea- 
 tortoise (j] ffaXarria xeKmyq), which was considerably larger, 
 and therefore more valuable for making bowls, than that of the 
 land or "mountain" tortoise (17 opeivrj 'xeKmvrj). There was 
 a well-known headland on the Coast of Peloponnesus called 
 " Tortoise Head " (Ohelonates), and this creature must have 
 been a peculiar feature of the shores of Aegina, or it would 
 not have been chosen as the type for her coins, whether it be 
 a religious symbol or not. At all events we know from the 
 story of Sciron the robber, slain by Theseus, that the sea-tortoise 
 was a familiar feature on the shores of the Saronic Gulf, as 
 the hapless travellers who were kicked over the rocks by the 
 caitiff were devoured by a large sea-tortoise which frequented 
 the strand below. This creature's picture is handed down on 
 a well-known vase-painting which commemorates the exploits 
 of Theseus. Finally, it may well be supposed that had not its 
 connection with the invention of the lyre attracted to that 
 instrument the name of " Tortoise " both in Greek and Latin, 
 we should have found the name employed for some sort of 
 vessel, as is the case with the Echinus. 
 
 Coming now to Central Greece, we find on the coins of all 
 the Boeotian towns (with the exception of Orchomenus in her 
 earliest issues) the well-known device of the Boeotian shield. 
 
 Fig. 45. Coin of Boeotia with shield. 
 
 This has been confidently pronounced to be a sacred emblem, 
 symbolic of a common worship, conjectured to be that of Athena 
 Itonia, whose temple near Coronea was the meeting-place of the 
 
332 THE GREEK SYSTEM. 
 
 Boeotians S whilst at Coronea golden shields were preserved in 
 the Acropolis". This may be so, but it is equally possible that 
 the shield represented a common monetary unit in ancient 
 times. The shield of early Hellas was a simple ox-hide buckler, 
 described in Homeric language simply as an ox-hide^- Amongst 
 barbarous peoples, as we saw above, weapons form one of the 
 regular commodities commonly employed as currency; the 
 Achaeans bought wine with hides as well as with oxen from 
 the ships that came from Lemnos, and as there can be no 
 doubt that the hide was a regular sub-multiple of the cow, it is 
 very probable that the ox-hide shield stood in a similar relation 
 to the cow, the chief or most universal unit ; and as we find 
 axes and half-axes among the prizes offered by Achilles as well 
 as kettles and caldrons, so we learn from a famous passage' that 
 shields were amongst the most usual articles offered as prizes 
 and therefore were regular units of currency: "For they strove 
 neither for an ox to be sacrificed nor yet for an ox-hide shield 
 which are wont to be the prizes for the feet of men, but they 
 strove for the life of the horse-taming Hector." 
 
 When silver money was struck, it was natural that the 
 barter-unit which came nearest in value to the silver di- 
 drachm would be equated to it, and the piece of silver would 
 accordingly be termed Shield or Tortoise, just as the silver 
 equivalent for the old copper rod was called the Obol, and 
 in due course the corresponding device would be impressed on 
 the silver coinage. The same explanation may probably be 
 
 FiQ. 46. Coin of Lycia. 
 
 applied in other cases, such as that of the boar on the coins 
 of Lycia. On the coins of the Gaulish tribe Sequani who made 
 
 ' Pausan. ix. 34. 2 Pausan. i. 25. 
 
 3 Iliad XVII. 381. < Iliad xxii. 158. 
 
THE GKEEK SYSTEM. 333 
 
 the best bacon and hams which came into the Roman market, 
 the swine is found'. Doubtless this animal was their chief 
 source of wealth, and formed a unit of barter, but we have not 
 space for any more examples. 
 
 It is worth noting that it is quite possible that the men 
 who issued the earliest coins of Boeotia and Aegina were 
 influenced in the shape they gave these coins by the actual 
 objects which they were replacing. The coins of Aegina with 
 their high round upper side and flat under side suggest the 
 general outline of a tortoise. As the people of Olbia, like 
 the Chinese, Burmese and Ceylonese, had to make coins 
 in the shape of a fish, so the Aeginetans acting under a 
 like instinct may have wished to give a conventional repre- 
 sentation of the tortoise. The earliest coins have the incuse 
 on the reverse divided into eight triangular compartments. Are 
 these the eight plates which form invariably the plastron or 
 under surface of all the tortoise family? Later on the 
 Aeginetan incuse is always in five compartments, but in 
 the two well-known triangular depressions we perhaps find 
 an echo of the tovioisQ-plastron^. The earliest coins seem 
 to represent a sea-tortoise, for the feet are real flippers quite 
 distinct in shape from the legs shown on the later coins. As 
 the plates of the carapace (upper surface) are not fully repre- 
 sented in the archaic coins, this omission may not be merely 
 due to rudeness of work, but rather because in the case of the 
 sea-tortoise the thirteen plates of the carapace are not so 
 prominent as in the land-tortoise. On the later coins where 
 the feet are those of the land- tortoise the coins accurately 
 represent the thirteen plates. 
 
 It has to be borne in mind that the shape of the incuse 
 depressions on the reverse of coins is very constant. Thus 
 on the Aeginetan coins we never find what is known as the 
 mill-sail incuse which is the peculiar feature of the reverse 
 
 1 Strabo 192, &Bev ol apidTai, rapix^iM twv ielui/ Kpe&v els rriv 'Viiiajv Kara- 
 Ko/d^ovTat. Hucher, Art Gaulois, PI. 78. The swine is also found on coins of 
 Bellovaci, Pictones and Armorican Gauls. 
 
 2 On the plastron of the sea-tortoise eight triangular patches are made very 
 conspicuous by pigmentation. 
 
334 THE GREEK SYSTEM. 
 
 of the early Boeotian coins, nor on the other hand do we 
 even find the eight-fold incuse on the coins of Boeotia. Some 
 influences must have determined the choice of form, such as I 
 have just suggested in the case of Aegina. Did the first 
 Boeotian Mintmaster shape his coins with the real buckler 
 in his mind's eye ? On the reverse of these coins we find 
 the incuse forming a rude X, which is bounded by a circle 
 of dots, whilst in the centre of the incuse is the initial letter of 
 the name of the issuing town, such as for Thebes, H for 
 Haliartus. Does the X-shaped incuse represent conventionally 
 the cross-bars of the frame of the shield seen at the back, 
 the circle dots indicating the outline ? The letters on these 
 coins are the earliest inscriptions on the coins of Greece Proper. 
 We can easily see how they came to be placed on the coins, as 
 soon as we remember that there was a A on the Lacedae- 
 monian shields, a 2 on the Sicyonian, a M on the Messenian ^. 
 Why do not we find the initial in the coins placed on the 
 front of the shield, where it must have stood on the real 
 buckler ? If as is held by the best authorities the coins of 
 Boeotia formed a federal currency, we see a reason for the 
 practice. As the silver shield replaced the real buckler, the 
 old unit which had been universally employed through Boeotia, 
 no town would have been permitted to put its initial on the 
 shield engraved on the obverse. No doubt the old actual 
 shield of currency was plain, and each purchaser painted the 
 initial of his own country upon it. The Mintmasters accordingly 
 of each town regarding the whole coin as a shield placed 
 the letter of these several states on the reverse. Baumeister 
 (Benkmdler, s.v. Wappen) gives pictures of the back of two 
 shields. The frame of the shield consists of a circular rod, 
 with two cross bars. The idea of making the incuse represent 
 the other side of the object given in relief on the obverse 
 seems to be just the stage between a complete representation 
 of the object as in the tunny of Olbia, and that evinced by 
 the early coins of Magna Graecia, on which the reverse gives 
 
 ' Photius Lex. s.v. Ad/i/3Sa. Eustathius on Homer p. 293. 39 seqq. 
 Xenophon Hell. iv. 4. 10 (which shows that the letter was on the front, of. 
 Pansan. iy. 28. 5). 
 
THE GREEK SYSTEM. 335 
 
 in the incuse exactly the same form as that in relief on the 
 obverse. 
 
 At first sight the result of this great variety of local units 
 apparently places impassable barriers to trade, but a know- 
 ledge of the actual facts of barbarous communities and their 
 monetary systems as they exist in our time easily dispels this 
 impression. I quoted above (p. 4G) the words of Mohammed 
 Ibn-Omar, wherein he points out that every separate district 
 in the Soudan has its own lower unit or units, whilst every- 
 where alike the ox and the slave are the higher units; these 
 local units are equated one to the other, so that there is no 
 difficulty in trading. The same holds true of ancient Greece ; 
 the tortoise-shell of Aegina may have been reckoned equal to 
 a certain amount of Attic olive oil or to a jar of wine of certain 
 size, which formed the unit of commerce at Thasos and Chios, 
 whilst in its turn a jar of wine was reckoned as equivalent to 
 a package of silphion from Cyrene, a kettle from Crete, or an 
 axe, or certain number of axes, or half-axes from Tenedos, or 
 an ox-hide shield from Boeotia. All were sub-multiples of the 
 ox, and had a fixed value in gold, and later in silver, as weighed 
 against grains of corn. This supposition is in complete accord 
 with the system revealed to us in the Homeric Poems, and 
 is confirmed by the evidence drawn from barbarous races in 
 modern times. It is likewise to be borne, in mind that the 
 tendency to place religious and mythological types on Greek 
 coins was one especially developed in the later but not in the 
 earliest period of coinage. No doubt aesthetic considerations 
 played a large part in the adoption of such types, which came 
 especially into prominence when Greek art was at its height. 
 On the early coins one simple type is the rule, whilst at a 
 later stage, besides the old national type, many adjuncts and 
 symbols are added. Contrast the early coins of Athens with 
 the later. The archaic issues have an olive spray and an owl, the 
 later have not merely the owl, but an amphora, and a symbol 
 in the field alluding to the legend of Triptolemus. Again, at 
 Argos the early coins have simply the wolf or half-wolf or 
 wolf's head, with a large A on the reverse, but in the later 
 times the A is accompanied by symbols, such as a crescent 
 
336 
 
 THE GREEK SYSTEM. 
 
 aud letters. The hare appears on the coins of Rhegium 
 and Messana, having been chosen as a type, according to 
 Aristotle, by the tyrant Anaxilas in commemoration of the 
 introduction of that animal by him into Sicily; but it also 
 appears on a rare coin of Messana, not as a main type, but as 
 caressed by Pan. This does not prove that the hare was a 
 symbol of Pan, but that for artistic purposes the rustic god in 
 the act of caressing the hare is chosen instead of the more 
 commonplace type of the hare all alone. So at Thasos the 
 coins with old Silenus quaffing from a wine-cup do not signify 
 that Silenus was a principal object of worship, but he is simply 
 added for picturesque effect. "We can at all events draw one 
 conclusion from the historical origin assigned to both this type 
 and that of the axe of Tenedos, that in the middle of the 4th 
 cent. B.C. the Greeks did not see any religious significance 
 in them, any more than they did in the representation of the 
 mule-car which had won at Olympia, placed on his coins by 
 Anaxilas. If, as has been so emphatically laid down by the 
 leading modern Greek numismatists, the types on Greek coins 
 
 Fig. 47. Coin of Messana. 
 
 are so essentially religious in origin, it is extremely difficult to 
 explain the extraordinary rapidity with which all such notions 
 as regards their origin must have vanished from the minds of 
 the most learned of the Greeks, at so early a date as the 4th 
 cent. B.C. (hardly more than two centuries after the introduc- 
 tion of the art of coining). The Greeks regarded those types 
 from much the same point of view as we regard St George 
 and the Dragon on sovereigns and crowns, or the Lady Godiva 
 riding in puris naturalibus on the Coventry tokens. The effort 
 
THE GREEK SYSTEM. 337 
 
 to turn agonistic into religious types by contending that, as 
 the Olympic festival was of religious origin, so the successful 
 chariot which had won at Olympia was a sacred symbol, can 
 only be regarded as an ingenious effort to attach by even the 
 most slender thread a simple commemorative type to a religious 
 origin. 
 
 There is not the slightest reason for treating with incre- 
 dulity the statement that Anaxilas introduced the hare into 
 Sicily. Pollux' tells us that there were no hares in Ithaca, and 
 from the same source we learn that the islanders of Carpathus, 
 wishing to add the animal to the products of their isle, intro- 
 duced a single pair, the descendants of which became in a 
 short time so numerous that they ruined the crops, a story 
 which finds a singular parallel in the history of the intro- 
 duction of the rabbit into Australia in our own days. The 
 hare was to the old Greek sportsman (as we know from the 
 Tracts on Hunting of Xenophon and Arrian) what the stag 
 was to the mediaeval baron, and the fox to the modern English 
 squire. If William the Conqueror, as says the chronicler, 
 " loved the tall deer as though he were their father," the 
 tyrant Anaxilas may well have prided himself upon the in- 
 troduction of the hare into Sicily in much the same manner 
 as modern sportsmen have brought the French partridge into 
 England. When once the type was started, the dislike of any 
 change in coin types is so strong that we need not be surprised 
 at the hare appearing for a long period on the coins of Messana 
 and Rhegium. Besides, the hare was considered by the Greek 
 gourmet as the choicest of viands : all readers of Aristophanes 
 are familiar with "jugged hare " as a proverbial expression for 
 " the best of cheer." 
 
 Variation of Silver Standards. 
 
 The connection between the types on early silver coins of 
 Greece and the earlier local units of value being probably such 
 as I have indicated, we next approach the question of changes 
 in the weight of the silver coins at various places and at various 
 
 1 Pollux, V. 66. 
 R. 22 
 
338 THE GREEK SYSTEM. 
 
 times. Besides the ordinary Euboic and Aeginetic standards we 
 find others such as the Ehodian, and the Ptolemaic, the former 
 so named because the island of Ehodes from the beginning of 
 the 4th century B.C. ceased to strike tetradrachms of the full 
 Attic weight of 270 grs. and coined instead pieces which range in 
 weight from 240 to 230 grs., the latter getting its name from the 
 dynasty of the Lagidae, who quickly dropped the full weight 
 of the tetradrachm (270 grs.) as struck by Alexander, and re- 
 verted to the Phoenician silver of 220 grs., which they used not 
 only for silver, but also for gold ; it is to this last fact that the 
 name Ptolemaic as given to the standard is really due, for as a 
 standard for gold it was certainly new. But not merely shall 
 we find coins standing so far apart from the usual standards that 
 we are obliged to give them distinctive appellations, but we 
 likewise find various modifications of the Aeginetic in various 
 places, whilst in some parts of northern Greece and Thrace we 
 shall find the so-called Phoenician and Babylonian standards 
 in occupation. It is hardly possible that mere degradation of 
 weight will account for all the phenomena; accordingly the 
 object of this section will be to show that from first to last 
 the Greek comm/imities were engaged in an endless quest after 
 himetallism : we shall find, as we have already indicated, 
 that whilst the gold unit never varies in any part of Hellas 
 until a late epoch, the silver coins exhibit differences not merely 
 between one district and another, but even between one period 
 and another in the self-same city or state. There is incontro- 
 vertible evidence to prove that the same trouble was caused by 
 the fiuctuation in the relative value of gold and silver as arises 
 in modem times. Xenophon^ in his treatise De Vectigalibus 
 (speaking of the benefit likely to accrue to the state if the 
 silver mines of Laurium were better worked) makes the most 
 interesting remark that "if any one were to allege that gold 
 too is not less useful than silver, that I do not deny, yet 
 this I know that gold, whenever it turns up in quantity, 
 
 1 Xenoph. Se Vectigalibus, iv. 10, el S^ tis ^iiaue koX xpv(tIov /i-qSh tJttov 
 XP^(^il''Oi' elyai ■^ dpyipLov, toDto /ih oiK avriXiyu, iKelvo fiivToi oTSa 6'ti Kal xpv<Tlov 
 oTav TToXii Trapatpavji, airb fiiv ari/wrepov ylyverai, rb de dpyipior nfuiiirepov 
 
THE GREEK SYSTEM. 339 
 
 becomes on the one hand cheaper itself, and on the other makes 
 silver dearer." This passage alone is sufficient to show how 
 sensitive was the old Greek money market in the beginning 
 of the 4th century B.C., and this statement is amply substanti- 
 ated on Italian soil by a passage quoted by Strabo' from 
 Polybius, from which we learn that after the discovery of a 
 rich gold mine in the land of the Taurisci of Noricum, within 
 the space of two months " gold went down one third in value 
 throughout all Italy." Such being the effect of a discovery of 
 gold, it is evident that either the silver currency must undergo 
 certain modifications in order that a definite round number 
 of silver units may be equal to the gold unit, or on the other 
 hand the gold unit must undergo modification. But as we 
 have shown that the gold unit remained unaltered throughout 
 all Hellas, Asia and Egypt down to the time of the Ptolemies, 
 it follows that whatever changes were necessary must have 
 taken place in the silver standards. Of this we have proof in 
 the case of Rhodes itself Down to 408 B.C. the three ancient 
 cities of lalysus, Camirus and Lindus issued each a separate 
 series of coins, Camirus on the Aeginetic standard, the other 
 two on the Phoenician. In 408 B.C. all these united in founding 
 the new city of Rhodes, and henceforward there is a single 
 coinage. At first the Attic standard seems to have been em- 
 ployed for silver, as rare tetradrachms of 260 grs. are found, but 
 it must have very soon given place to the so-called Rhodian, 
 the tetradrachm of which ranges from 240 to 230 grs. About 
 the same time (400 B.C.) the Rhodians began to issue gold 
 staters of the so-called Euboic standard, and for a century 
 this double issue of gold and silver continued unbroken. It is 
 plain, from the case of this famous island, that it is only the 
 silver standards which changed. There can be no doubt that 
 the unit by which gold in bullion was reckoned before that 
 metal was coined was the so-called Euboic or ox-unit, but during 
 the archaic period we find both the so-called Phoenician (220 
 grs.) and Aeginetic (drachms of 92 grs.) being employed for 
 silver in the island, whilst after 408 B.C. gold is issued on the ox- 
 
 1 Strabo, it. 208, awepyaaaijAvoiv Si avv ^apjSdpois tCiv 'ItoXmtuv 4v Si/i-qvip, 
 TraaaxPW" ^ XP"''^"" ciavorepov yev4<r8ai r<fi rplTiji fi^pei Ka6' SX^iv tt\v IraXiav. 
 
 22—2 
 
340 THE GREEK SYSTEM. 
 
 unit, but silver, although at first on this standard, immediately 
 changes to the Rhodian of 240 grs. Evidently then the fixed 
 element is the gold, the fluctuating the silver. The coinage of 
 Rhodes likewise exemplifies the doctrine already indicated, that 
 the employment of religious and mythological symbols seems 
 to mark not the earlier but rather the later stages of Greek 
 coining. Thus Camirus employed the fig-leaf, lalysus half a 
 winged boar, and Lindus the lion's head with open jaws, but 
 after 408 Helios the Sun-god, from whom all Rhodians alike 
 claimed descent, and to whom the island was sacred^ becomes 
 the regular type, with the type parlant of the Rose (Rhodon) on 
 the reverse. 
 
 Next let us take the money of Macedonia, where there was 
 an abundant coinage of both gold and silver. The Pelasgian 
 tribe of Bisaltae, and the Thracian Edonians and Odomanti, had 
 during the half century which preceded the Persian wars all 
 struck silver on the so-called Phoenician standard. It is com- 
 monly supposed that they obtained this standard from the 
 important town of Abdera, which at the same period employed 
 a like standard, and it is suggested that Abdera had borrowed 
 it from her mother Teos, who had borrowed it from Miletus 
 and the other great towns of the Ionian seaboard, among which 
 it was especially employed for electrum. But unfortunately, 
 whilst the types of Teos and Abdera are the same (a seated 
 Griffin), the staters of Teos weigh only 186 grs., which is the 
 Aeginetic, not the Phoenician (220 grs.) standard. Shortly 
 after the overthrow of the Persian host Alexander I. of Macedon 
 acquired the land of the Bisaltae along with the rich silver 
 mines, which were said to produce for him a talent daily, and 
 he adopted both the types and standard of the Bisaltian silver 
 coinage, only substituting his own name for that of the Bisaltae. 
 During the century which elapsed between Alexander I. and 
 the accession of the famous Philip II. the coinage of Macedon 
 and that of Abdera followed the same course in each case; 
 the Phoenician standard of 280 grs. gave way to the so-called 
 Babylonian or Persian of about 170 grs. Again, it has been 
 suggested that Abdera influenced the neighbouring communities 
 
 ^ Pindar, Olymp. vii. 58 sq. 
 
THE GREEK SYSTEM. 341 
 
 in this change. But when Philip came to the throne he returned 
 to the Phoenician standard for silver, and when for the first 
 time in Macedon he issued a bountiful coinage of gold staters, 
 they were struck on the ancient gold unit, the so-called 
 Euboic standard of 130 grs. But hardly had Philip slept with 
 his fathers, and Alexander reigned in his stead, when a need 
 was felt for a change in the silver standard. Accordingly the 
 latter in the early years of his reign began, and continued to 
 his death, to strike his silver on the same standard as his gold. 
 Let us now study the lessons to be learned from this history of 
 currency. There can be no reasonable doubt that the ox-unit 
 or stater was the unit by which gold was estimated from first to 
 last in that region. Unless it already existed Philip would not 
 have employed it for his gold coinage at a time when he was 
 making changes in his silver, but would have assimilated his gold 
 to his silver standard. But, as before remarked, just because 
 gold was not coined anywhere in Greece until the closing years 
 of the 5th century, and in all transactions it passed as bullion, so 
 much the stronger was the reason for keeping its weight-unit 
 unchanged. But was the standard of 220 grs. really an im- 
 ported Phoenician, or was it not rather one arrived at in that 
 region by the natives themselves owing to the relations then 
 existing between silver and gold? It is evident from the ac- 
 count given of the Bisaltian silver mines that in the time pre- 
 ceding and immediately posterior to the Persian invasion silver 
 was exceedingly abundant in all that region. It is then by no 
 means unlikely that it required ten silver pieces of 220 grs. 
 each to make the equivalent of one gold unit of 130 grs. With 
 the exhaustion of the silver mines, and perhaps a greater out- 
 put of gold, silver became dearer, and consequently 10 silver 
 pieces of 170 grs. each were now equal to a gold stater. Abdera 
 on the coast would come perfectly within the sphere of such 
 changed conditions, and her standard would consequently like- 
 wise undergo modification. With Philip's accession, fresh con- 
 quests and a general development of resources may have tempo- 
 rarily thrown more silver on the market, thus inducing him to 
 revert to the 220 grs. standard, but the exploiting of the famous 
 mines of Crenides increased the supply of gold to such an 
 
342 THE GREEK SYSTEM. 
 
 extent that by the time Alexander mounted his father's throne 
 gold stood to silver in the relation of 10 : 1, and it was found 
 extremely convenient to coin this on the same footing as gold, 
 10 silver pieces of 135 grs. being exactly equal to the gold stater 
 of like weight. A like explanation applies to the coinage of 
 Thrace. Amongst the Thracian tribes who dwelt near Mount 
 Pangaeum and worked the gold and silver mines of that region 
 the art of coining had been known from the 6th century B.C. and 
 they issued silver coins of about 160 grs. This is regarded by 
 some as debased Babylonian or Persic standard. But it is far 
 more rational to suppose that in that region gold was more 
 plentiful in proportion to silver than it was at that time further 
 west in Macedonia, and accordingly a certain number of silver 
 didrachms of 160 grs. were found to represent the gold stater or 
 ox-unit. It seems most unlikely that a people long acquainted 
 with both gold and silver could not devise for themselves a 
 simple method of making some convenient number of silver 
 pieces be equivalent to one gold, and that, on the contrary, 
 having once obtained a certain standard fixed for silver in Asia 
 Minor, at a time when gold was to silver as 13 : 1, they would 
 blindly cleave to this standard, no matter how great a change 
 took place in the relation of the metals. In face of the state- 
 ments of Xenophon and Polybius already quoted and the fact 
 that Solon deliberately constructed a new silver standard, it 
 is simply impossible to believe such a doctrine. 
 
 On the opposite shore from Thrace, lay the flourishing 
 city of Cyzicus. This wealthy community commenced to issue 
 electrum staters and hectae in the 5th century B.C., if not 
 earlier, the former being about 252 grs., the latter 41 grs. 
 These electrum staters have been shown by Professor Gardner 
 to have contained gold and silver in about equal proportions ^ 
 
 ^ Numismatic Chron. vii. 185. That the Cyzicene staters were at some time 
 and at some places (Cyzicus itself ?) less in value than a Dario is made possible 
 from the new-found Mimiambi of Herondas (vii. 96 seqq.) ; where i Daries 
 seem worth more than 5 staters : 
 
 Taihr/i Se Scutreitr Kelclvo rb irepov ^cvyoa 
 
 (jeoi < u> Tov, 
 
 K. a-TaTTJpa(7 irivTe vaX /ici, Beoitr (po[i.]TS,i, 
 
THE GREEK SYSTEM. 343 
 
 This most important fact, taken in connection with the literary 
 evidence derived from Xenophon and Demosthenes, makes it 
 probable that the Cyzicene stater of 252 grs. was counted 
 equal to a Daric of 130 grs. of pure goldi. " These coins of 
 Cyzicus," says Mr Head, "together with the Persian Darics 
 formed the staple of the gold currency of the whole ancient 
 world, until such time as they were both superseded by the 
 gold staters of Philip and Alexander the Greats" 
 
 Not only did they circulate side by side with the Darics, 
 but it is worthy of notice that when the Cyzicenes struck coins of 
 pure gold {circa 413 B.C.) they were of Daric type and standard. 
 The earliest silver coins (430—412 B.C.) were small pieces of 
 32 and 18 grs., whilst the larger coins which come later are 
 on the Phoenician silver standard of 212 grs. (412 B.C.), whilst 
 from 400 B.C. to 330 B.C. the Rhodian standard of 235 grs. pre- 
 vailed. From the story of her coinage we learn clearly that 
 at Cyzicus the inferior metals bowed to the sway of gold. The 
 electrum stater of 252 grs. is made equal to the pure gold unit, 
 and whilst the silver standard changes from 212 grs. to 235 grs. 
 the gold and pale gold pieces in currency remain inviolate. 
 Once more, it is almost certain that some displacement in the 
 relative values of the metals had caused the raising of the 
 standard from 212 grs. to 235 grs. One thing certainly .is 
 beyond doubt, and that is the utter improbability of the intro- 
 duction of the 235 grs. standard being in any way due to the 
 influence of Rhodes. This remark likewise applies to Chios, 
 where from a very early period (600 — 490 B.C.) side by side 
 with electrum staters of 217 grs. we find didrachms of silver of 
 123 — 120 grs., "a weight peculiar to Chios," says Mr Head, 
 " which was probably the Phoenician somewhat raised." But why 
 was it raised ? The real solution is that the relations between 
 gold, electrum and silver at Chios necessitated the striking of 
 
 T) \pi.\Tpi,' <:'Ev>iTiipur Tjjxiffqv wS,<rav 
 
 Xa^eTv aviiyovff' dXX' lyii fuv [exffa]i/5W 
 
 Krji> Ti<r(rapdj p,oi SapuKoia iivlxrx''lT<u 
 
 oreiveKiv f^ev ttjv yuvatKa rw^dfet 
 
 KaKoTffi Si[i>]poia: a XP^'^V- 
 
 1 Xen. Anab. v. 6. 23 ; vii. 3. 10. Dem. Phm-m. p. 914. 
 = Op. cit. p. 449. 
 
344 THE GREEK SYSTEM. 
 
 silver on a standard a few grains lighter than the gold unit 
 in use (the Persian Daric), and the electrum stater of 217 grs. 
 Space forbids our going through all the cities of the Ionian 
 coast in detail, but the principle which we have laid down and 
 illustrated from the currency systems of several leading states 
 is sufficient to indicate the method by which we would explain 
 the fluctuations in the silver standards employed at different times 
 in various states. The Daric is the universal gold unit of all 
 this region; by its side is the electrum stater usually of 217 grs. 
 and most probably the equivalent in value of the pure gold com 
 of 130 grs.: along with them we find singular fluctuations in 
 the silver currency ; towns that are close neighbours employing 
 different systems contemporaneously. 
 
 There is, however, one state which cannot be passed over 
 without more particular reference. At an earlier page I spoke 
 of the gold mines of Thasos, which had attracted the attention 
 of the Phoenicians at a very early time. But, in addition to 
 the mineral wealth of their own island, the Thasians drew a 
 huge annual revenue from their mines on the mainland. Al- 
 though the first influence in the island was Phoenician, and 
 the Thasians themselves were lonians from Paros, instead of 
 finding the Phoenician standard employed for its silver coins, 
 we see them striking their archaic coins on the so-called 
 Babylonian system. Under the supremacy of Athens this 
 standard fell so much that it eventually coincided with the 
 Attic (138 grs.) or even was lower. The Thasians, after re- 
 volting from Athens in 411 B.C., struck gold coins for the first 
 time; these were on the Euboic or ox-unit standard (con- 
 sisting of half-staters and thirds). But about the same period 
 they began to coin silver on the so-called Phoenician of 220 
 grs. It is indeed strange that in the early age, when the 
 Phoenician tradition was still strong, they did not employ 
 the 220 grs. standard, but only resorted to it after employing 
 for a long period the Babylonian and Attic standards. It is 
 evident that in Thasos, as elsewhere, there had existed the 
 same gold unit for untold generations, else at the very time 
 when they revolted from Athens and adopted a new standard 
 for their silver, they would not have struck gold on what is 
 
THE GREEK SYSTEM. 345 
 
 commonly called the Attic or Euboic standard. It is evident 
 that the changes in the silver standards were due to changes in 
 the relation of silver to gold, the fall in standard from 168 grs. 
 to 135 grs. indicating perhaps that silver, which at first was 
 to gold as 1 : 13, had gradually grown dearer. 
 
 Commercial Weight System. 
 
 We must now turn to the commercial weight system. As 
 elsewhere, one of the chief commodities to come under such a 
 system was copper, and the history of the weighing of this 
 metal, as far as it can be learned, will be of great importance 
 to us. Now we should naturally expect that at Athens, which 
 had in later days but one standard for gold and silver, copper 
 likewise would have been estimated on this unit. But, as a 
 matter of fact, there were two distinct standards in use at 
 Athens, as is proved by two weights preserved in the British 
 Museum, the inscription on one of which is Mina of the 
 Market (MNA AFOP), that on the other is Mina of the 
 State (MNA AHMO). This mina of the market is the same 
 as that called the Gommercial Mina on an Attic inscription^ 
 where its weight is given as that of 138 silver drachms, that 
 is, the weight of an Aeginetic mina of silver. Athens had not 
 coined any money of her own up to Solon's time, but seems 
 to ' have employed the coins of Aegina. But this standard, 
 although no longer employed for silver, did not fall into desue- 
 tude. As already pointed out, all peoples have felt the need 
 of a heavier standard for cheap articles than that which serves 
 for gold. Probably the Aeginetic mina had been used at 
 Athens for copper: accordingly, when Solon made his new 
 silver standard for the weighing of silver, the Aeginetic standard 
 was found convenient for less costly and more bulky wares, and 
 was therefore retained in use as the mercantile or market 
 standard, the name STATE being given to the silver standard. 
 
 We have learned already that in the early stages of society 
 copper and iron are not sold or appraised by weight, but rather 
 by measurement. We have also seen that there is every reason 
 to believe that the Greek obol originally was a spike or rod 
 
 ' Corp. Inscr. Graec. 126, ay^roi t] /j-m i] i/nropiK-ij ^TeipavTi<p6pov Spax/Ji^s 
 ixaThv TpiaKovra KaX oktw irpbs to, ixTafffda tA iv ti} apyvpoKoireltfi. 
 
346 THE SICILIAN SYSTEM. 
 
 of copper of a definite length and thickness. If we can^ be- 
 lieve the statement of Ephorus given by Strabo that Phidon 
 pf Argos established a weight as well as a measure system for 
 the Peloponnesians (although Herodotus is silent as regards 
 weights), it is not at all improbable that, taking this story 
 in conjunction with the dedication of the old bar money by 
 Phidon in the temple of Hera, we have here a genuine tra- 
 dition of the superseding of the bars of metal, the value of 
 which simply depended on their dimensions, by a system based 
 essentially on weight. It is plain that, as copper was weighed 
 both at Aegina and Athens by the Aeginetic silver standard, 
 copper most probably was never estimated by weight until 
 after the forming of the separate silver standard in the way 
 already described. 
 
 We have previously noticed the fact that the two principal 
 terms applied to silver coins, drachm and obol, give clear in- 
 dications that they have been borrowed from an ancient system 
 of copper (just as we shall presently find that the denarius, the 
 special term employed for their silver currency by the Romans, 
 owes its origin to the ancient copper as). If further proof 
 were required, it is afforded by the name employed for the 
 subdivisions of the obol. The latter at Athens was divided 
 into 8 chalci or coppers (xoKicoT). The smallest silver coin at 
 Athens was the half-obol, but in some places names, Trichal- 
 cum, Tetrachalcum, etc. were given to copper coins. Now, as 
 the Aeginetan obol weighed about 16^ grs. and the Attic 
 11^, the former is one-third greater than the latter. But we 
 shall see shortly that as the Attic obol has 8 chalci, the Aegi- 
 netan must have had 12, from which it follows that the ancient 
 copper obol or bar used in Aegina, throughout Peloponnesus, 
 and at Athens, and probably throughout Boeotia, was every- 
 where the same. 
 
 The Sicilian System. 
 In dealing with the Sicilian and Italian systems we must 
 reverse the order of treatment of the metals, and as it is in the 
 copper that we shall find the closest link between the Greek 
 and those other systems, we shall therefore commence with 
 that metal. 
 
THE SICILIAN SYSTEM. 34,7 
 
 On the Italian Peninsula and in Sicily we find a series of 
 weight and monetary terms totally distinct from any found in 
 Greece Proper. From this alone we may infer that, even before 
 the settlement of any Greek Colonies in Magna Graecia and 
 Sicily, there existed a well defined system, if not of weight, at 
 least for the exchange of copper by fixed standards of measure- 
 ment. In various Sicilian cities we find small silver coins 
 called litrae; these beyond all question are simply the repre- 
 sentatives in silver of an ancient copper unit employed by the 
 Sicels, and which they had brought with them into the island. 
 These Sicels were a tribe of the great Italian stock (itself a 
 branch of the Aryan family) closely related to the TJmbrians, 
 Latins, and Oscans, had probably formed the van of the Aryan 
 advance into the Peninsula, and had finally crossed the straits 
 and overcome the Sicanians, an Iberic race, who were the 
 earliest inhabitants of the island of whom any historical record 
 exists. The word litra is merely a dialectic form of the 
 same original lidhra^, from which the Latin libra itself is 
 sprung. But whilst we shall have little difiiculty in finding 
 out the weight at which the Latin libra was fixed, we have just 
 as great difiiculty in discovering that of the Sicilian litra, as we 
 have lately found in the case of the ancient Greek copper obol. 
 As copper was only coined at a late period, and the copper 
 coins are merely tokens, or money of account, we are unable to 
 arrive at any conclusion as to the original full weight of the 
 litra from any data afforded by the copper coins of the various 
 Sicilian states, although, from the circumstance that many of 
 these coins bear marks of value, at first sight it might seem 
 far otherwise. Thus at Agrigentum in the period preceding 
 415 B.C. the copper litra weighed about 750 grs., between 
 415 B.C. and 406 B.C. 613 grs., and from 340 B.C. to 287 B.C. 
 it was about 536 grs. only. At Himera between 472 B.C. 
 and 415 B.C. it was about 990 grs., but within the same period 
 it fell to 200 grs., whilst at Camarina between 415 B.C. and 
 405 B.C. it was about 221 grs. Not only therefore is it futile to 
 attempt any statement of the reduction of the litra in Sicily in 
 general, but also to arrive at any sound approximation to its 
 
 1 Of. Wharton, Etyma Latina, s.v. litra. 
 
348 THE SICILIAN SYSTEM. 
 
 full original weight, as far as the weight of the copper coins is 
 concerned. On the other hand, any calculation based on the 
 relative values of copper and silver has been up to the present 
 unsatisfactory, owing to the great uncertainty which still 
 prevails, Mommsen making the relation in the earlier period 
 stand as 288 : 1, whilst Mr Soutzo thinks it never can have 
 been higher than 120 : 1. 
 
 The latter view I have already proved to be untenable when 
 we apply the test of the value of cattle, and it was made 
 probable that in the 5th century B.C. silver was to copper 
 as 300 : 1. From this it will be possible to show that the 
 full weight of the copper litra was originally about 4900 grs. 
 
 Any effort to determine the original weight of the copper 
 litra by a new method calls for a merciful consideration, even 
 though it too may fail.. Whilst the original weight of the 
 litra is still a matter of doubt, we are fortunately completely 
 acquainted with the method of its subdivisions. The litra 
 was divided into 12 parts called XJngiae, Unciae or Onciae, 
 a name which is no other than the Latin Uncia. This at 
 once brings us face to face with the Roman copper system, 
 where the as was the higher unit, and was divided into 
 12 unciae (ounces). But there are other striking coincidences 
 of nomenclature. Thus ^ of the as was called sextans ; one- 
 sixth of the litra is called Hexds (e^a^), and the Triens 
 and Quadrans are paralleled by the trias (r/Dta?) and tetras 
 (reT/ja?) although there is a difference in the application of 
 these terms. Then the five-twelfths of the as is Quincunx, the 
 same fraction of the litra is Pentonldon {ireToyKiov). We have 
 plainly therefore a common Italo-Sicilian copper system, the 
 terms of which were adopted and Graecised by the settlers in 
 Italy and Sicily. 
 
 Now we have already adverted to the fact that the earliest 
 Sicilian towns which coined money, Naxos, Zancle and Himera, 
 although Chalcidian colonies, yet employed the Aeginetic 
 standard, whereas we might naturally expect them to follow 
 the Euboic. This would give the maximum of 16|-grs. for 
 the silver obol. Now according to Pollux, Aristotle in his lost 
 treatise on the constitution of Agrigentum says that the litra is 
 
THE SICILIAN SYSTEM. 349 
 
 worth an Aeginetan obol, and Pollux goes on to say that "one 
 -would find in him (Aristotle) in his Constitution of the Hime- 
 raeans likewise other names of Sicilian coins, such as imgia, which 
 is equivalent to one chalcus, and hexas, which is equivalent to 
 two chalci, and trias, which is equivalent to three chalci, and 
 hemilitron (half litra), which is equivalent to six, and litra 
 which is equivalent to an obol'." It is plain from this that 
 Aristotle knew that the Aeginetic obol was divided into twelve 
 chalci. Thus the proposition laid down above, that the ancient 
 Greek copper obol was a rod or spike divided into 12 parts, is 
 thoroughly proved. The reason why the Attic obol had only 
 8 chalci is now plain; it was, as we saw, only two-thirds of the 
 Aeginetan and consequently only contained two-thirds of the 
 whole number of pieces of copper into which the ancient copper 
 unit was divided. Now, as we find the Chalcidian settlers of 
 Himera and other places not using their native Euboic standard 
 for coining, but employing the Aeginetic, and as the Aeginetic 
 obol was equal to the Sicilian litra, we are justified in the con- 
 clusion, that when the Greek settlers reached Italy and Sicily 
 they found their Italic kinsfolk using a copper unit exactly the 
 same as that employed in Greece; and that finally, when they 
 began to coin, they found it more convenient to strike silver on 
 a standard which was both convenient in reference to exchange 
 with gold, as I have shown above, and had the further advantage 
 of corresponding accurately in value to the ancient copper unit 
 in use among the Sicels. If, as I indicated, silver was to copper 
 as 300 : 1, the Aeginetic silver obol of 16| grs. would be worth 
 5000 grs. of copper (practically the same as the early Roman 
 libra). It follows then that if we could only discover the weight 
 of the Sicilian litra we should know that of the old Greek copper 
 obol. Is this possible? We have no reason to doubt that the 
 obol was a rod of copper of a certain size, which in the course of 
 time after the introduction of coined money shrank up until 
 the original rod was only represented by what had been its 
 equivalent in silver, or a small copper coin, whose name still 
 survives in the ob used in old account books as the symbol for 
 
 1 Pollux, IX. 80. 
 
350 THE ITALIAN SYSTEM. 
 
 half-penny^. The Greek coinage has preserved for us but faint 
 traces of the various steps in the degradation of the copper obol, 
 but, as we have already seen, we find the Sicilian copper litra 
 in various stages of its decadence from 990 grs. down to 200 grs. 
 Again, whilst no trace has as yet been found of obols at all 
 in the archaic shape of rods, or anything approaching it, we 
 find in Sicily at Agrigentum litrae which are in form distinct 
 survivals of an earlier stage when the litra, like the obol, was a 
 rod or bar of copper. These are very strange looking lumps 
 of bronze made in the shape of a tooth with a flat base, having 
 on one side an eagle or eagle's head and on the other a crab, 
 while on the base are marks of value ::, ."., : (tetras, trios, 
 hexas). The uncia is almond-shaped with an eagle's head on 
 one side, and a crab's claw on the other ^. As we found the 
 Chinese knife shrinking up into a shorter and thicker mass until 
 at last it only survives in the round cash, so in all probability 
 we here find the Sicilian litra in its mid course from its 
 original full size and shape to that of the ordinary round 
 copper coin of a later age. That the shape of the original 
 copper unit of the Italians was that of a rod or bar we shall 
 now proceed to demonstrate in the case of the Roman as. 
 
 The Italian System. Bronze. 
 
 As the cow formed the highest unit in the monetary 
 system of ancient Italy, so the lowest unit employed was a 
 certain amount of copper called an as. We have already 
 found the cow serving the same purpose in Sicily (as late as 
 the time of Dionysius forming the rateable unit at Syracuse). 
 The systems of Further Asia, where the buffalo stands at the 
 head of the scale and the hoe or a piece of raw metal of a 
 certain size stands at the bottom, form a perfect analogy in 
 modern times. As far as its value and divisional system go, 
 we have identified the Sicilian litra with the ancient Hellenic 
 
 ' Cf. Shakespeare, I. Henry IV. ii. 4, 590, in FalstafE's tavern bill : " Item, 
 Anchovies and sack, 6d. Item, bread, Ob. monstrous ! But one halfpenny 
 worth of bread to such an intolerable deal of sack I " 
 
 2 Head, op. eit. p. 105. 
 
THE ITALIAN SYSTEM. 351 
 
 obol or rod, and we have in turn discovered a very close 
 resemblance between the divisions of the litra and that of the 
 as. I now propose to examine into the original nature of this 
 denomination, and the form of the object to which it was 
 applied. This will have been effectually accomplished, if I 
 can succeed in establishing the proposition that the as was 
 primarily a rod or bar of copper, one foot in length, divided into 
 12 parts, called inches (unciae), thus coinciding with the Greek 
 obol inform, as also in its duodecimal division. 
 
 We must, as a preliminary, note carefully several most 
 essential facts connected with the as: (1) The term as (as 
 used in respect of metals) is never employed for either gold 
 or silver, but is appropriated to bronze exclusively; (2) it is 
 not the Roman unit of weight, for that is expressed by the 
 general term libra, a word exactly corresponding to the Greek 
 Talanton, since it means both the weight and the scales ; (3) the 
 as is not confined to weight, but is also employed as the unit 
 of linear measure equal to the foot, and also as the unit of 
 land measure equal to the jugerum or acre. 
 
 The following table exhibits the subdivisions of the as : 
 
 As (Pes, Jugerum) 
 
 Deunx = f^ 
 
 Dextans |f 
 
 Dodrans | 
 
 Bes I 
 
 Septunx -^ 
 
 Semis | 
 
 Quincunx -^ 
 
 Triens ^ 
 
 Quadrans ^ 
 
 Sextans -J 
 
 Uncia ^ 
 
 Semuncia -^ 
 
 Sicilicus f^ 
 
 Sextula Y^ 
 
 Scriptulum ^^ 
 
 Now it has been hitherto assumed by all writers that the 
 
352 THE ITALIAN SYSTEM. 
 
 system of division employed in the as as a unit of weight has 
 been transferred to measure. This however is contrary to all 
 experience, for, as we have had occasion constantly before to 
 notice, weight units are derived from measures, e.g. the biishel 
 from the measure of that name, and so on. In the next place 
 as the as is not the unit of Roman weight, if even the measure 
 unit was borrowed from the weight, we ought to expect 
 the foot to be called a libra rather than an as. It is far more 
 likely that a unit originally employed for measure would in 
 time give its name to a weight-unit corresponding in mass to 
 the original measure-unit. There are besides certain pieces 
 of evidence afforded by the nomenclature of the submultiples 
 which point directly to the original as being a measure rather 
 than a weight-unit. The 24th part of the uncia is called the 
 scriptuhmn, little scratch, or line (scribo), which is exactly trans- 
 lated by the Greeks as gramme {ypa/j,/u.rj, scratch or line)'. Now 
 whilst 24 strokes make an excellent method of dividing the 
 uncia in its capacity of inch, they of course have no significance 
 as subinultiples of uncia, meaning ounce. Moreover, the forms 
 of several of the best known divisions of the as, such as triens, 
 quadrans, sextans, which are not easy to explain on the hy- 
 pothesis that the terminology was primarily applied to weight, 
 on the other hand admit of a ready solution when we take the 
 as as originally a unit of measure. For sextans means not a 
 sixth, but that which makes a sixth, triens not a third, but that 
 which divides in three parts, and quadrans not a fourth, but 
 that which makes fourfold, i.e. divides into four, for quadra 
 means not a fourth part, but that which has four parts (hence 
 usually a square). If we regard these words as referring to 
 certain lines drawn across a bar of metal, their meaning is 
 obvious. Whilst sextans uncia, the ounce which makes a sixth, 
 is nonsense, sextans linea, the line which makes a sixth, gives 
 excellent sense, so likewise triens linea fits in admirably with 
 the required meaning, whilst quadrans Uvea seems to mean 
 the line which divides the whole into four parts. 
 
 ' The forms scripulum, scrupulum, scrupulun are all due to its simply being 
 regarded in later times as a weight, and thus falsely identified with scmpulus, a 
 small pebble. 
 
THE ITALIAN SYSTEM. 353 
 
 The etymology of the word as has long been a puzzle. 
 Scholars starting with the assumption that as was the Roman 
 abstract term for unity have accordingly searched for an ap- 
 propriate derivation. Some have identified it with the Greek 
 heis one (eh through a Tarentine a?), whilst the most recent 
 attempt connects it with the first syllable of etementum. The 
 same principle has been carried out with regard to uncia, which 
 has been treated simply as meaning unit and connected with 
 unus and unicus. 
 
 Now it is notorious that the Roman mind was essentially 
 concrete, and found great difficulty in arriving at abstract 
 ideas, and consequently at abstract terms. This alone would 
 make us hesitate to believe that as had originally begun 
 as an abstract term meaning unit, and rather incline us to 
 believe that it started in life as a name for some common 
 concrete object. But we have seen above that the numerals 
 in all languages seem originally to have meant certain actual 
 physical objects which served as counters, such as the fingers 
 and toes {decern Sixa, digitus Sa/tTvXo?), seeds or pebbles. If 
 such has been the origin of the various names for unit, we 
 can hardly believe that any term for unity can have originated 
 independently of some concrete object. To add to the mists 
 which hang round the origin of the as, its division into 12 
 parts is taken to indicate a Babylonian source. Now the 
 Roman foot was divided, not merely into 16 fingers like the 
 Greek, but also into 12 unciae or inches like our own. The 
 latter is most probably the true Italian system, as it is that 
 found among their cousins and neighbours the Kelts, as well 
 as amongst the Teutonic peoples. With ourselves still the 
 rustic measures inches by his thumb, just as he measures feet 
 by means of his own natural foot. The ancient Irish foot was 
 divided into 12 thumbs or inches (ordlach, Lat. pollex, the 
 initial p being lost in Irish)^ The Romans too (as did likewise 
 the Teutonic peoples, e.g. Icelandic tomme, an inch) used the 
 thumb {pollex) as the ordinary measure in practical life^ The 
 division then into 12 unciae is simply the result of the fact that 
 
 ' Book of Aieill, p. 335. 
 - Caesar, B. G. iii. 13. 
 
 R. 23 
 
354 THE ITALIAN SYSTEM. 
 
 a certain natural relation exists between the breadth of the 
 thumb and the length of the foot, and as the relation held 
 true just as much for the Kelt as the Chaldaean, there was no 
 need for the ancient Italians to borrow their duodecimal system 
 from the East. Now what are we to say as to the origin of 
 the word uncia? Does it mean anything more or less than 
 the breadth of the (thumb) nail ? The use of wnguis, a nail, 
 as a measure was common in Latin, as we know from the 
 phrases transversum unguem (the thickness of a nail) and latum 
 wnguem (a nail's breadth) side by side with transverswn digitvm 
 (a finger's thickness) in Plautus. Uncia may be simply a 
 derivative from unguis ; there is no phonetic impossibility, 
 and even if there were any linguistic irregularity, false analogy 
 with unicus would amply account for it. The use of a word 
 meaning nail to express the divisions of the foot is completely 
 paralleled by the ancient Hindu system, where the finger- 
 breadth is termed angala, i.e. nail (cognate of unguis and ovv^). 
 Next we come to the word as itself, which appears in old 
 Latin as assis. It is masculine in gender, which of itself is 
 sufficient to throw doubts on its being a really abstract word. 
 Can it be that we have a close relative of it in asser a rod, bar, 
 pole, which is likewise masculine in gender ? Whilst one form of 
 the name was specially confined to a small rod or bar of copper, 
 the other was employed in a wide and general way. These two 
 forms assis and asser, -is are completely analogous to vomis and 
 vomer, -is, a ploughshare. The meaning rod is in complete 
 harmony with what we have said about the Greek obol. All 
 that is now wanting to make our proof complete is some evidence 
 that the primitive Italian as was really in the form of a rod or 
 bar. The most archaic specimens of ancient Italian bronze 
 money as yet described are those found at the Ponte di Badia 
 near Vulci in 1828. These consisted (1) of quadrilaterals broken 
 in pieces, weighing from 2 to 3 pounds each, stamped with an 
 ox and trident, (2) cube-shaped pieces of copper without any 
 mark, weighing from an ounce to a pound, and (3) some 
 ellipse-shaped pieces for the most part weighing two ounces^ 
 But in the British Museum are preserved a number of pieces of 
 
 ^ Blacas, Mommsen, i. p. 177. 
 
THE ITALIAN SYSTEM. 
 
 355 
 
 bronze which are roughly quadrilateral. A cursory examination 
 showed me that, whilst two parallel sides exhibit the marks 
 of a mould, the two remaining sides displayed unmistakable 
 
 Pig. 48. Aes Eude. 
 
 signs of fracture. Several of them are end pieces, showmg 
 the voluting of the mould on two sides and at one end, whilst 
 the other end shows marks of having been broken (Fig. 48). 
 
 23—2 
 
356 
 
 THE ITALIAN SYSTEM. 
 
 Several of them bear stamps, or letters. There can be no 
 doubt that these are pieces of short bars of bronze, which were 
 afterwards cut up, as occasion demanded. The imprints on 
 them prove them to be of comparatively recent date. If there- 
 fore the asses still retained their bar shape after the art of 
 stamping metal to serve as currency had come into use, a 
 fortiori the primitive as of Italy must certainly have been 
 nothing more than a plain rod or bar of copper, which passed 
 from hand to hand as the obols in Greece, and the bars 
 of iron and copper pass at the present among savages of 
 Africa and Asia^ This was what was called by the ancient 
 writers the raw copper {aes rude), as distinguished from the 
 stamped copper (aes signatum) of a later date. The fact that 
 
 Fig. 49. Bronze Decussis. 
 
 early specimens of aes signatum, such as the decussis, bearing 
 a cow on both obverse and reverse (Fig. 49), were still made 
 in the shape of a bar, is a further proof that such was the 
 original form. 
 
 It will be observed that I can give no positive evidence for 
 
 1 It ia worth Eotioing that Plutarch {Poplicola 11) translates the libral asses 
 of early Eome by the Greek oiolos ; ^p di ti/xtj Trpo^aTov jiiv d^oXol .S^ica, ^obs di 
 eKarbv oiiiro> vofiiafiarL xpw^^^'wi' TroXXy rire rCiv 'Vufiaiwp, dXXA Trpo^areiats Kal 
 KTrivoTpotplms eiSrivoipToiv. It is quite possible that Plutarch embodies a genuine 
 tradition that the original as and obol were the same. Otherwise like 
 Dionysius of Haliearnassus he would have represented the asses by the value in 
 Greek money of his own time. For he can hardly have supposed that at 
 any time an ox was worth only 100 of the obols of his own time. 
 
THE ITALIAN SYSTEM. 357 
 
 the length or breadth of the as. The pieces in the Museum are 
 all fragments, and, even if there were any of them whole, they 
 would not by any means decide the original length, although 
 they would of course represent the weight. For as they are 
 late, they would probably have been made at a time when the 
 original rod was shrinking up into a more compact form, just 
 as the Chinese bronze knives get shorter and thicker. But 
 the fact remains that the as was identified completely with 
 the Roman foot measure, the divisions being the same in each. 
 We therefore may with great probability infer that the as was 
 originally a piece of copper a foot in length, and of a known 
 thickness. We have seen that copper and iron are not weighed 
 in the early stages of society, but are appraised by measure- 
 ment. Why should not the same hold true for Rome ? It 
 may be asked, how came it that the as was taken as the typical 
 unit for weight and superficial measure, and to express 
 even an inheritance ? The answer is not far to seek. To ex- 
 press fractional parts has ever been a great difficulty with 
 primitive people. As the Malays cannot conceive abstract 
 numerals, but must append the concrete padi to each of their 
 numbers, so the old Italian found it necessary to employ some 
 concrete object, the subdivisions of which were familiar, to 
 express the fractional parts whether it be of an estate or any- 
 thing else. The most common unit in use was the rod of copper 
 divided into 12 thumbs. Accordingly, if a Roman wished to 
 say that Balbus was heir to one-twelfth of an estate he ex- 
 pressed this by the homely formula that Balbus had come in 
 for owe inch, the denominator 12 being mentally supplied, as 
 everyone knew that there were 12 inches in the copper bar. 
 The same principle of taking some familiar object, the ordinary 
 method of dividing which was known to all men, is seen in the 
 method of expressing one-tenth. The Roman denarius was 
 divided into 10 lihellae ; accordingly, when Cicero wishes to 
 say that a certain person had come in for a tenth part of an 
 estate he says that he has come in for a lihella (heres ex lihella). 
 From this the reader will at once see that we might just as 
 well declare that the word denarius is an abstract word meaning 
 unity as make the same assertion about the as. Again, when 
 
358 THE ITALIAN SYSTEM. 
 
 the Roman land surveyors elaborated their system of mensu- 
 ration, they found that the simplest method of expressing the 
 fractional parts of the jugerum was to employ the old duodecimal 
 method of the as. Nor is this without a parallel elsewhere. 
 As the yard was the common English unit of linear measure, 
 it was applied to the most common unit of land, the quarter 
 of the hide, which was accordingly termed a yard of land, or a 
 virgate (virga terrae). The English analogy is even still more 
 complete, for as the as or foot-rod became the unit of weight, 
 so in Cambridge the yard of butter is identical with the pound 
 of butter ^ 
 
 Our next step will be to trace the process by which 
 the as or rod became the general weight-unit, the pound 
 (libra). The term libra is not the oldest Latin name for weight, 
 for poiidus or its cognate verb pendeo, which literally means 
 to hang, is the true claimant for that position. Libra seems 
 properly to mean the balance, as is seen from the legal formula 
 (employed in Mancipatio) per aes et libram, by means of copper 
 and the balance. From the fact that its chief use was to weigh 
 asses of copper, the mass of an as came to be termed the weight 
 par excellence, just as the most usual amount weighed in the 
 Greek talanta (scales) became the talanton par excellence. This 
 process can be illustrated by modern examples. Thus in the 
 south of Ireland potatoes are sold by the unit of 21 lbs., which 
 consequently is termed a weight, and instead of speaking of so 
 many stones or hundi-edweights, everyone speaks of a weight of 
 potatoes. But, as already remarked, it was only at a compara- 
 tively late epoch that the bars of copper were weighed. It 
 would be only with the growth of greater exactitude in com- 
 mercial dealings that the art of weighing, which was employed 
 for all dealings in gold and silver, would be applied to copper. 
 Just as the Malays and Tibetans have been gradually taught 
 by the careful Chinese to employ weights commercially, so the 
 Italian tribes may have been led to do so under the influence 
 of the astute Greek traders from Magna Graecia and Sicily. 
 
 1 So the word rfiark means not only a weight hut is also used as a linear 
 measure = 48 alen, and also as a measure of area, as in the term arable mark 
 etc. See Appendix. 
 
THE ITALIAN SYSTEM. 359 
 
 The system in vogue for gold was that of our old friend the 
 ox-unit. This is proved from the fact that not only is the 
 oldest gold coinage of the Etruscans, the close neighbours of 
 Latium, based upon this standard, but that also in Sicily and 
 Southern Italy there was the small gold talent, the three-fold 
 of the ox-unit. This three-fold of the stater was also used 
 at Neapolis. Although the earliest Greek colonies in Sicily 
 employed at first the Aeginetic standard for silver, we soon 
 find them reverting to the gold or Euboic standard for that 
 metal, whilst the early silver coinage of the Etruscans (before 
 350 B.C.) is also of the Euboic standard. We may with high 
 probability assume that when the Sicilians and Italians first 
 essayed to weigh their copper rods, they naturally employed 
 the standard already in use for gold and silver. The highest 
 unit of this was the small talent of 3 staters which weighed 
 about 405 grs. The bar was divided into 12 inches, and it 
 was found that an inch of copper rod closely approximated in 
 weight to the small gold talent. The weight of the bar, which 
 was the ancient unit for copper before weight had been em- 
 ployed, now became the standard weight-unit for that metal. 
 It is to be observed that this ounce of 405 grs., though some 
 27 grs. less than the full Roman uncia of later times, is only 
 15 grs. lighter than the Roman ounce prior to 268 B.C., for it is 
 an ascertained fact that the old Roman uncia did not exceed 
 420 grs.^ It must be remembered that the weight of the ounce 
 would depend on the standard foot by which the bar was 
 measured. Now, whilst the Roman foot measures 296 raillim., 
 there was likewise in use in Campania, and probably in many 
 parts of Southern Italy, a foot of 276 millim. The relation of 
 bars of these lengths and of a given thickness to the Roman 
 libra is not without interest. If we take an ordinary engineer's 
 table of materials we shall find that a copper rod a Roman foot 
 long, and half a Roman inch in diameter, weighs 5040 grs. 
 Now, as the Roman pound weighs 5184 grs. this approximation 
 seems almost too close to be a mere coincidence. If on the other 
 hand we take a rod of a foot of 276 millim. and with a diameter 
 of the corresponding half-inch, we shall get a pound of 4680 
 1 Many of the Roman unoiae in the British Museum are under 410 grs. 
 
360 THE ITALIAN SYSTEM. 
 
 grs. and an ounce of 390 grs., which is certainly not far from the 
 weight of the small gold talent. It follows from this that we 
 may expect pounds of different weights in Italy, according as 
 the foot-unit varies in different districts. 
 
 In later times, besides the pound of 12 unciae, there 
 were several commercial pounds on Italian soil, the pound of 
 16 ounces (from which our own avoirdupois is probably de- 
 scended), that of 18 unciae, and that of 24. The last two are 
 easy of explanation, since one is simply the double, the other 
 one and a half times the Roman pound. But perhaps a 
 different explanation must be sought for the 16 ounce pound. 
 The foot was divided by Greeks and also by Italians into 16 
 fingers as well as into 12 thumbs. Was therefore the pound 
 of 16 ounces simply derived from the division of the foot bar 
 into 16 fingers, the weight of the finger being however equated 
 to that of the Roman thumb or inch of copper? 
 
 The as, having been once subjected to weight, its hundred- 
 fold, the centumpondium or "hundred weight," became the 
 highest Roman weight-unit. Thus the as and the centum- 
 pondium of the Italians correspond to the mina and talent of 
 the Greeks. But it will be observed that the Italians ob- 
 tained their higher unit by the old decimal system, whereas 
 the Greeks had boiTowed the mina and its sixtyfold fi-om 
 Asia. The centumpondium must be regarded as a true-born 
 Italian unit, not one borrowed from Greece or Asia, and of 
 this there is further proof We saw by the ancient Roman 
 law that the cow was estimated at 100 asses, the sheep at 
 10 asses. No doubt from time out of mind 100 of the bars 
 of copper,' which formed the chief lower unit of barter, made 
 one cow, just as in Annam 280 little hoes make one buffalo 
 (p. 167). When copper came to be weighed, the amount of 
 copper which formed the equivalent of the highest unit of 
 barter, the cow, was taken as the highest weight-unit. From 
 what I have said above it is not improbable that the Roman 
 libra and the Sicilian litra of copper were almost equal in 
 weight. The fact that the Greek writers always employed 
 the Sicilian word litra (XtV/sa), to translate the Latin libra, 
 likewise indicates that in the Greek mind there was a tra- 
 
THE ITALIAN SYSTEM. 
 
 361 
 
 dition of their identity. And if the doctrine here put forward 
 of the original nature of the as be right, nothing can be more 
 likely than that the Italians who had crossed into Sicily and 
 their kinsfolk who had remained behind employed rods of 
 similar size, and that when they began to weigh the latter, 
 the '■ weight " (libra or litra), derived from the standard copper 
 rod, should be the same in each region, until certain modifi- 
 cations occasioned by new monetary conditions according to the 
 needs of different communities had caused some divergency in 
 coin weights, although as a commercial weight the litra re- 
 mained unchanged. As Aristotle identified the Aeginetic obol 
 and chalcus with the Sicilian litra and onkia, we may with 
 some plausibility suggest that the ancient Greek copper obol 
 or spike and the Italian as or rod were identical in dimensions 
 and in origin. 
 
 In Greece the copper obol rapidly fell in weight, for, when 
 once silver currency had been introduced, copper was thrust 
 aside, and it was not till the fourth century B.C. that copper 
 coins came into use. When the copper obol appears as a coin 
 it is but a small piece, being in fact a mere token. 
 
 The history of the degradation of copper was seen better in 
 Sicily, where we found the litra still weighing 990 grs., but it 
 
 Fig. 50. ks (Aes grave). (Before 2nd Punic War.) 
 
 rapidly sank to only 200 grs., evidently in this case also 
 being mere money of account. For as the silver litra was 
 about 13J grs., unless the 200 grain copper litra was a mere 
 token, silver would have been to copper as 17:1, which is 
 obviously absurd. In the case of the Italian as the process 
 
362 THE ITALIAN SYSTEM. 
 
 is still clearer, for we have every stage of the as, from the bars 
 which I have described through the libral as (aes grave), the 
 sextantal as, the uncial and half- uncial, down to the small coin 
 of the empire commonly called "a third brass." 
 
 Fig. 51. As (half uncial standard). 
 
 Fig. 52. As, 3rd Cent. a.d. ("Third Brass") 
 
 Gold and Silver. 
 
 Whilst in the infancy of coining the Sicilian silver litra was 
 probably the same as the Aeginetic obol, that is about 16f grs., 
 the Aeginetic didrachm being probably treated as a deca- 
 litron (ten-litra piece), nevertheless after no long time the 
 common Euboic standard of 135 grs. was employed at Syra- 
 cuse and elsewhere, and we have the authority of Aristotle for 
 the statement that the Corinthian stater was called a deca- 
 litron. Corinth, as we saw above, used the 135 grain unit for 
 her famous Pegasi, commonly known as " Colts " (■jr&Xot), and 
 
 Fig. 53. Didrachm of Corinth. 
 
 therefore the litra was by this time 13^ grs. Now, in Etruria 
 we find about 400 — 350 B.C. a silver currency struck on this 
 same 135 grs. standard. These coins bear marks of value, X on 
 coins of 131 grs., A on those of 65 grs., II' on those of 32 grs., 
 and I on those of 14 and 13 grs. It is plain therefore that 
 
THE ITALIAN SYSTEM. 363 
 
 the stater of 135 grs. was considered to consist of 10 units 
 of 13|- grs. each. In other words, whatever the Etruscans may 
 have called their stater, it was exactly the same in weight and 
 method of subdivision as the decalitron of Syracuse. At a 
 later period (350—268 B.C.) we find on coins of like weight the 
 symbols XX instead of X, X instead of A, A instead of II'. The 
 unit now is exactly half of what it was at an earlier stage, 6| 
 grs. instead of 13^ grs. 
 
 Not till 268 B.C., just on the eve of the First Punic War, 
 did Rome first -coin silver. This coin, called denarius, as its 
 name implies, represented 10 asses. It was divided into four 
 parts, each of which was called a sestertius or 2\, and was 
 marked with the symbol ||S representing that number. 
 
 It is very remarkable that the Etruscan coin of the second 
 series, marked 2^, is only very slightly heavier than the Roman 
 sesterce {sestertius) which bears a similar mark. Hence it has 
 been very reasonably inferred that when the Romans set about 
 the coinage of silver, they simply adopted with slight modifica- 
 
 FiG. 54. Sesterce of first Boman silver coinage. 
 
 tion the silver system employed by their neighbours across the 
 Tiber. This is all the more probable, as it is almost certain 
 that, though Rome did not strike silver she like Athens before 
 the time of Solon, and like Syracuse, used freely the coins of 
 other communities for a long time previously. The Etruscan 
 coins would therefore serve as silver currency at Rome. We 
 may then assume that the monetary system must have been 
 much the same on both sides of the river. Accordingly, 
 since in 268 B.C. we find the Romans striking a coin in silver 
 representing 10 copper asses, which is almost the same in 
 weight as the Etruscan coin marked X, we may reasonably 
 infer that, if the Romans had commenced coining silver a 
 century earlier, their denarius or 10-as piece would have been 
 the same weight as the Etruscan. 
 
364 THE ITALIAN SYSTEM. 
 
 Now besides the litra, which we found to be both a copper- 
 unit and a silver coin in Sicily, there is another term of great 
 interest, especially as it plays an important part in the history 
 of Roman money. The general Latin name for a coin is nu- 
 mus, which in the later days of the Republic usually meant a 
 denarius when used in the more restricted sense, but in the 
 earlier period it was the term specially applied to the silver 
 sesterce (sestertius). This is almost certainly a loan-word, for 
 Pollux is most explicit in warning us that, although the word 
 seems Roman, it is in reality Greek and belongs to the Dorians 
 of Sicily and Italy ^. It is always a name of a coin of silver in 
 Sicily, being so used by Epicharmus. The coin meant by this 
 poet cannot have been one of great value, for he says : " Buy 
 me a fine heifer calf for ten nomi" It was in all proba- 
 bility the Aeginetan obol, for ApoUodorus in his comments 
 on Sophron set it down at three half (Attic) obols, that is. 
 almost 17 grs. This is confirmed by the fact that an Homeric 
 scholiast makes the small talent weigh 24 nomi, which gives 
 nearly 17 grs. as the weight of that unit. Crossing into Italy, 
 we find that according to Aristotle^ there was a coin called a 
 nomnmos at Tarentum, on which was the device of Taras 
 riding on a dolphin. This is the familiar t3^e of the Tarentine 
 
 Fig. 55. Didrachm of Tarentum. 
 
 didrachms which, from their first issue down to the invasion 
 of Pyrrhus (450 — 280 B.C.), weigh normally 123 — 120 grs., 
 although one specimen weighs 128 grs. This coin Mommsen 
 recognized as the noummos of Aristotle. Professor Gardner 
 afterwards suggested that the diobol, on which occasionally the 
 same type is found, was rather the coin meant. Recently 
 
 ^6 3^ KoO/i/ios So/cei fih ehai."Pufiatav Tovvofxa, rod vo/jtlff/jiaTOS, fori Se "EWtivikIiv 
 2 Pollux IX. 84. 
 
THE ITALIAN SYSTEM. 365 
 
 Mr A. J. Evans has almost proved this hypothesis impossible 
 by showing that all the diobols yet known are probably later 
 than the time of Aristotle^ As, however, this rests on negative 
 evidence, and is liable to be overthrown at any moment by the 
 discovery of an archaic diobol, it is advisable to cast about 
 for some more positive criterion. Heraclea of Lucania, the 
 daughter-city and close neighbour of Tarentum, as we know 
 from the famous Heraclean Tables (which scholars are agreed in 
 regarding as written about the end of the 4th cent. B.C.), em- 
 ployed as a unit of account a silver nomas. It is so probable 
 that the nomas employed at Heraclea {circ. 325 B.C.) would be 
 the same in value as that employed at Tarentum in the time 
 of Aristotle (06. 322 B.C.), that if we can prove the nomas of 
 Heraclea to be a didrachm and not a diabol, we may henceforth 
 hold with certainty that the nomas of Tarentum was the larger 
 coin. 
 
 On the Heraclean Tables it is enacted that those who held 
 certain public land should pay certain fines in case they had 
 failed to plant their holdings properly ; four olive trees were to 
 be planted on each schoenus of land, and for each olive tree 
 not so planted a penalty of 10 nomi of silver was to be ex- 
 acted, and for each schoenus of land not planted with vines 
 the penalty was two minae of silver''. The schoenus is identi- 
 cal with the Eoman actus (half a jugerum), being the square 
 of 120 feet. Four olive trees were the allowance for each 
 schoenus. Now if we can determine the number of vines 
 which were planted on a schoenus, we shall be able to get a 
 test of the value of a nomas. Two minae of silver contained 
 in round numbers 110 Tarentine didrachms of 123 grs. each, 
 or 675 diobols of about 20 grs. each. Olives were many times 
 more valuable than the vine, so that any result which will 
 make the vine about the same value as the obol will be 
 absurd. 
 
 1 Evans, Horsemen of Tarentum, pp. 9 — 11. 
 
 2 Tabulae Heracleenses (Boeekh Corp. Inscrip. Qraec. 5774—5; Cauer, 
 Delectus 40, 41) i, 122. al Si Ka /i-ri Tre^vreifcuvTi Karh yeypa.fi.fJi/a, KareSiKiffBev 
 irhp nev rhv iXalav S^KO. yi/tws dpyvpla irhp rb (pvrbv Skoo-tov, ir&p di t&s d/nirAws 
 dio fivas apyvploi Tvhp Tav cx"^'""' i^'^'^'rai' , 
 
366 THE ITALIAN SYSTEM. 
 
 Now Mr A. J. Evans, when in Southern Italy, at my re- 
 quest kindly ascertained that vines, when trained on poles on 
 vineyard slopes, are usually about 3 yards apart, whilst when 
 trained on pollard poplars (as is much more usual in Cam- 
 pagna), they stand about 6 yards apart. In the case of the 
 former about 160 vines would go to a schoenus (1600 sq. yards), 
 whilst in the latter case barely 50. We cannot doubt that the 
 distance between the vines must have been much the same in 
 ancient as in modern times. 
 
 If now we take the nomos to be a diohol, each vine is worth 
 4| nomi, or 14 nomi, according as there are 50 or 150 vines to 
 the schoenus. Now, as the valuable and slow growing olive 
 is only worth 10 Tiomi, and it is impossible to believe that 
 the relative values of olive and vine could have ever been 
 such as those arrived at on the assumption that the nomos is 
 a diobol, we must turn to the alternative course and take the 
 oiomos as a didrachm. The penalty for a schoenus of vines is 
 two minae or 110 didrachms. If 150 vines go to a schoenus, 
 each will be worth about § didrachm, 15 vines being equal to 
 one olive, or taking 50 vines to the schoenus, each vine will be 
 worth about two didrachms, 5 vines being worth one olive. This 
 result is so rational that we need hesitate no longer to regard 
 the well-known Tarentine didrachm as the nomos (noummos) of 
 Aristotle. 
 
 There is such a difference between the nomos of Sicily, 
 identical with the Aeginetan obol, and that of Tarentum that 
 we are forced to conclude that the term nomos is not specially 
 applied to any particular coin unit. In Sicily we found the 
 native unit, the litra, identified in certain cases, at least in 
 earlier times, with the. Aeginetan obol as well as with the 
 nomos. Why two names nomas and litra for the same unit? 
 Is one Sicilian and the other Greek? This at least gives a 
 reasonable explanation. The Dorians then in Sicily gave the 
 name to their earliest coins, nomos, with them indicating the 
 unit of currency established by law. just as did nomisma among 
 other Greeks. As in Sicily the Aeginetic obol was the legal 
 coin {nomos) par excellence, so at Tarentum, where didrachms 
 were the first coins to be struck, the term (nomos) was applied 
 
THE ITALIAN SYSTEM. 367 
 
 to that unit. We may therefore expect to find the term nomos 
 applied to various kinds of coins among the Italiotes and Italians, 
 according to the particular coin chosen by each state as its own 
 unit of account. 
 
 Accordingly we find the term nomas applied to certain 
 bronze coins struck on the sextantal (two ounce) and uncial 
 standards, at Arpi and other towns, which are inscribed N II 
 
 (the double numTnus), N I (nummios), (quincunx) 
 
 (triens), . . . (quadrans), . . (seoctans), . S (sescyimcia), . (uncia), and 
 S {semuncia). The divisions being those of the as, it is clear 
 that the nomas, or current coin in those places, was the reduced 
 as. Finally, when the Romans first use the term nunvnvus, it 
 means the silver sestertius (2^ asses), the one-fourth of the 
 denarius or ten-as piece, which weighed a scruple {i.e. IS^grs.) 
 at the time of the first Roman coinage of silver. Here 
 we have all our positive evidence for the nomas. As diobols 
 of 18 to I7grs. are found in the coinages of various towns 
 in Magna Graecia, such as Arpi, Caelia, Canusium, Rubi, 
 and Teate, it has been plausibly held that such a diobol was 
 the nomas par excellence of these states, and that it was from 
 contact with them that the Romans learned both the use and 
 the name of such a monetary unit. But Rome may have been 
 influenced by her Etruscan neighbours, for, as we have seen, 
 the smallest denomination in the second silver series of 
 Etruscan coins (of which the coins weigh 129 grs., 32 grs. and 
 17 grs. respectively) is just the weight of the Roman sestertius, 
 and bears the symbol All (2^), just as the latter bears IIS (2^). 
 Taking into consideration these facts, it looks as if the Romans 
 and Etruscans grafted on to a native system the diobol, or 
 current silver coin of Southern Italy, the Romans (and for all 
 we can tell the Etruscans likewise) adopting at the same 
 time the name nummv^. Finally, we observe that this nummus 
 is identical with the Sicilian nomas, which in turn was found 
 to be none other than the Aeginetic obol. The Roman sester- 
 tius being a scriptulum (17^ grs.) in weight, we thus find a 
 direct connection between the latter and the Aeginetic obol 
 (16f grs.). This need not surprise us, for it is most natural that 
 in the welding of a weight system (partly foreign, and on 
 
368 THE ITALIAN SYSTEM. 
 
 the native side only employed for gold and silver) and of a 
 system of measurement employed for bronze, certain features 
 derived from the special silver units in use would be introduced 
 into the new system, which afterwards became universal for 
 weighing all commodities. The term Sicilicus^ employed for 
 the quarter-ounce is good evidence for this hypothesis. Its 
 name seems to mean simply Sicilian. In weight it was about 
 108 grs. Now, didrachms struck on such a foot are found in 
 the Greek cities of south-western Italy, at Velia, Neapolis and 
 at Tarentum, after the time of Pyrrhus. Did the Romans, who 
 must have carried on by weight all dealings in silver up to 
 268 B.C., treat such coins as quarter-ounces, and ultimately take 
 the name of the coin (wrongly connecting it with Sicily) to 
 designate the quarter-ounce ? In like fashion it was probably 
 discovered that the Aeginetic obol of the Greek colonists was 
 about equal in weight to the line (scriptulum) which is one- 
 twenty-fourth of the inch (uncia) of copper. Thus as there are 
 24 nomi in the Sicilian talent, so there are 24 scriptula in the 
 Roman uncia. These considerations help to explain the re- 
 lations which existed between the nomas (Aeginetic obol), 
 sestertius, and scruple. 
 
 Mr Soutzo^ gives a very different account of the nomas. 
 Starting with the Egyptian hypothesis he makes all the 
 Italian weight systems of foreign origin. He thus makes the 
 Roman libra the j^ of a Roman talent, which he seems to 
 identify with a light Asiatic talent^ Starting with the talent 
 he supposes that on Italian soil it was divided into 100 librae 
 instead of 60 heavy or 120 light minae, as in the East. 
 Each of these librae or pounds was divided into 12 ounces, 
 and each ounce into 24 fractions. He holds likewise that the 
 Italians adopted from the East the use of bronze " comme 
 matiere premiere de leurs ^changes," at the same time as they 
 obtained the first germs of civilization and their first weight 
 
 1 Boeckh, Metrol. Unters. 160, takes the Sicilicus as originally the Silioian 
 quadrans in the Roman silver reckoning. Cf. Mommsen, Blacas, i, 243. 
 Hultsch, Metrol. p. 145. 
 
 ^ Etude des monnaies de I'ltalie antique. Premiere partie, pp. 8 and 16. 
 
 ■5 Ihid. p. 29. 
 
THE ITALIAN SYSTEM. 369 
 
 standards. The cenbwmpondivm or 100 weight therefore he 
 takes as his prime unit. But besides the talent and the mina 
 and the centumpondivm and libra or as, according to Mr Soutzo, 
 " all the Italian peoples availed themselves of an intermediate 
 weight unit : this was the nomas or decussis^- This unit was the 
 libral nomas, the twelfth of the heavy talent, being worth ten 
 ininae or librae, and the libral decussis, the tenth of the centum- 
 pondium, weighing 10 librae." The monetary nomas and decus- 
 sis, he thinks, played an important part in the history of Italian 
 coinage. He admits however that no specimen of either nomas 
 or decussis of libral standard is known, the heaviest being a 
 decussis of the Koman triental (one-third) standard, whilst the 
 pieces from Venusia and Teanum Apulum marked NI and 
 N II (nomas and double nomas), representing 10 and 20 minas 
 respectively, belong to a still much more reduced standard. 
 The simple multiples of the as (libra) and litra, such as the 
 tripandiits and dupondius, were just as rarely cast in the libral 
 epoch. The mina or the as with their fractions, on the 
 contrary, were the kinds most employed : originally the series 
 was ordinarily composed of the as (marked I or sometimes 
 
 ), the semis (S), the triens ( ), the qiiadrans (. . .), 
 
 the sextans (. .), the unda (.) and semmicia (Z). In some series 
 the as is rare and the semis is wanting, but in addition to the 
 other denominations here given the quincunx (:•:) and the 
 
 dextans (S , 1 semis + 4 unciae) are found. The presence or 
 
 absence of these pieces characterizes certain Italian and Sicilian 
 monetary systems I All the evidence virtually which can be 
 produced by Soutzo for this hypothetical nomas is that at 
 Syracuse the Corinthian stater of 135 grs. was called a deca- 
 litron, that the Tarentine didrachm of 128 grs. (max.) was 
 similarly divided into 10 litras, that the Romans employed the 
 tenfold of the as (decussis) and when they coined silver called 
 their silver unit a denarius as representing 10 copper asses, 
 and the fact that certain copper coins such as those of Arpi, 
 called nomi, were evidently regarded as containing 10 units, the 
 half being the quincunx. But, as we have already seen, the 
 real explanation of these coins seems to be that they represent 
 
 1 Ibid. p. 30. 2 Soutzo, ibid. p. 31. 
 
 E. 24 
 
370 THE ITALIAN SYSTEM. 
 
 reduced asses. We must remember that the heaviest Roman 
 as yet known is only 11 ounces, whilst the great proportion of 
 the earliest specimens are only 10 unciae or (dextantals). When 
 the idea of a real copper currency for local purposes gained 
 ground, and it was found that it was not necessary to have the 
 as of account of full weight, and at the same time to enable the 
 state to make a profit of this copper currency which was solely 
 for home use (just as our Mint makes a large profit of our 
 silver coins), the first stage in reduction was to take off an 
 ounce, or much more frequently two full ounces. I have al- 
 ready pointed out the vitality and universality of the wncia 
 as an unit, and have given the reasons for this. Hence arose 
 asses or bars of 10 ounces. The number 10 had of course great 
 advantages, and presently, when further reductions in the 
 copper currency took place, certain communities clave fast to 
 the decimal system and, instead of taking off some more whole 
 ounces, simply reduced the ounce itself, and retained the 
 denomination, continuing to place the marks of value as before. 
 In those Hellenized states of Apulia just referred to this 
 reduced copper as or litra was the legal unit, and therefore 
 denominated a nomos, especially as it probably corresponded 
 in value (at least as money of account) to the silver unit or 
 nomos in circulation in each district. But whilst Mr Soutzo 
 seems wrong in his view of the nomos, there can be no doubt 
 that there was a consensus among the Sicilians and Italians in 
 favour of making an intermediate unit between 1 and 100, the 
 tenfold of the litra and as, into a higher unit. The Syracusan 
 decalitron and the Roman decussis and denarius are incontro- 
 vertible facts. For the latter at least a most interesting con- 
 nection with a unit of barter can be proved. We saw that by 
 the Lex Tarpeia (451 B.C.) a cow was counted at one hundred 
 asses (centussis, centumpondium) whilst a sheep was estimated 
 at 10 asses (decussis). The reader will observe that, even if 
 the theory were true that the Roman centumpondium is the 
 starting-point of the Roman weight system, and that it was 
 borrowed from the East, the cow all the same plays a most 
 important part in the founding of the system. It would be 
 another instance to prove the impossibility of framing a weight 
 
THE ITALIAN SYSTEM. 371 
 
 Standard independent of the unit of barter, just as we have 
 already seen that the Irish, when borrowing a ready-made" 
 weight system from Rome, found it absolutely necessary to 
 equate the cow to the ounce of silver, and as Charlemagne 
 had to adjust the solidus by the value of the same animal. If 
 again the centumpondium and as grew up independently as 
 weight units on Italian soil, and copper was weighed there 
 before gold, the cow is evidently the basis of the system; whilst 
 again, on my hypothesis that copper went by bulk in bars of 
 given dimensions, and was not weighed until long after the 
 scales had been employed for gold, the cow is directly connected 
 with that unit of weight (the gold ox-unit of 135 grs.) which 
 ultimately forms the basis of the uncia (as weight) and libra. 
 On every hypothesis alike the cow must be retained as the 
 chief factor in the origin of the Roman weight system. It 
 will be observed that Mr Soutzo offers no explanation why 
 the Romans, instead of retaining the sexagesimal division of 
 the talent which they are supposed to have imported, subdi- 
 vided it according to the decimal scale. It cannot be alleged 
 that they had any deep-rooted antipathy to the duodecimal 
 system, seeing that the as was divided into 12 vmciae, and the 
 ounce into 24 scruples. The fact that the Romans resisted 
 in this respect the Greek influences, which were so potent a 
 factor in their civilization, is strong evidence that the em- 
 ployment of the tenfold and hundredfold of the as was of 
 immemorial native origin, and most intimately connected with 
 the animal units, which must certainly be held to be autoch- 
 thonous. As we found in Further Asia and Africa hoes or bars of 
 metal as the lowest unit of currency, so many hoes being worth 
 a kettle, so many kettles a buffalo, so in ancient Italy 10 bars 
 (asses) of copper made a sheep, and 10 sheep made a cow. It is 
 exceedingly probable that the same system prevailed among 
 the Sicels and Sicilian Greeks, 10 litras going to the sheep, 
 10 sheep to the cow. For we saw on an earlier page that at 
 Syracuse down to the time of Dionysius the cow remained the 
 unit of assessment, just as at the present moment the buffalo 
 is the unit of assessment among the villages of Annam ; and, 
 just as with the latter the buffalo is the unit of value, so we 
 
 24—2 
 
372 THE ITALIAN SYSTEM. 
 
 may well infer that with the Sicilians the cow played the same 
 r61e. It may therefore be assumed with considerable proba- 
 bility that the employment of the decalitron and decussis as 
 monetary units was originally due to their connection with the 
 value of the sheep. 
 
 As Soutzo has observed, the degradation of the local copper 
 series moved on most unequal lines, and no doubt in some 
 places the decussis did not represent perhaps one half the value 
 of its archetj^e, the sheep, whilst at the same moment the 
 copper unit in another community stood at almost its original 
 weight and value. Where silver was coined the degradation of 
 copper went on all the quicker; there was a tendency more 
 and more to get rid of the old cumbrous copper coins, and 
 to employ those of a lighter and more portable size. Moreover 
 the inter-relations between copper and silver made the coinages 
 in these metals act and react upon each other. Thus the state 
 after reducing the copper would reduce likewise the silver, so 
 as to make the two series correspond. This was probably 
 facilitated in some cases at least by the change in the relative 
 value of these metals. Italy was not a silver-producing region, 
 whilst it was rich in copper. Naturally with the increase of 
 commerce and the development of silver mines in neighbour- 
 ing countries such as Spain, silver became more abundant and 
 the price of copper rose accordingly. We have had occasion 
 already to remark that the abundance or scarcity of gold or 
 silver is indicated by its being employed or not for coinage. 
 In the case of gold we know that it is only when the supply of 
 that metal is in excess of its demand for purposes of ornament 
 that it is or can be employed in the form of coined money. 
 The history of the coinage of Persia, Lydia, Macedonia, Rhodes 
 and elsewhere in ancient times, as well as the history of 
 mediaeval gold coining, make this evident, whilst modern 
 Hindustan teaches us the same lesson. Of course in times of 
 great financial straits under the pressure of war a gold coinage 
 was sometimes issued, as perhaps at Athens' in 407 e.g. and as 
 
 1 If we take the Ktavhv K6fi.fw, of Aristophanes {Ranae 720) to refer, as the 
 scholiast ad loc. asserts on the authority of Hellanious and Philochorus, to a 
 gold issue in b.o. 407, which was much alloyed. As Mr Head says it is quite 
 
THE ITALIAN SYSTEM. 3?3 
 
 at Rome during the second Punic war in 206 B.C. Backward- 
 ness in the coinage of silver among certain peoples is probably 
 to be accounted for in the same way. The employment of iron 
 money at Sparta (and Byzantium) was probably due to the dearth 
 of precious metals rather than to any ordinance of Lycurgus 
 against the employment of the latter. If accordingly we find 
 that Rome did not coin silver until 268 B.C. we are justified in 
 concluding that it was from want of silver she had been so long 
 in following the example of the Etruscans and the Greeks. 
 
 It is certainly most significant that within four years after 
 the capture of Tarentum (272 B.C.) and the subjugation of all 
 Southern Italy we find her issuing a well-matured silver 
 cun-ency. Doubtless by her conquests she obtained a vast 
 supply of the precious metal, for we know from the records 
 of Livy and Pliny that great masses of foreign coins and bullion 
 flowed into the treasury after every fresh conquest. We may 
 therefore reasonably assume that previous to 272 B.C. silver had 
 been much dearer in relation to copper. 
 
 But to return. We have seen that with the imprinting of 
 some device on the primitive bars of copper, the tendency to 
 reduce their weight would quickly evince itself Accordingly 
 it was possible that in certain places when the coinage of silver 
 began, and there was still a desire to make the silver unit equal 
 to the copper, the latter having been already reduced, the silver 
 would be proportioned thereto. Thus when silver was first 
 coined in some towns in Sicily, the silver Aeginetic obol 
 of 16^ grs. was regarded as the equivalent of the copper litra, 
 but when Syracuse started a coinage of Corinthian staters, a 
 piece of silver of 13^ grs. was accounted as the litra. 
 
 But in other parts of Italy the process was somewhat 
 different. For we find the silver unit when once fixed remain- 
 ing the same in weight, but simply having its denomination 
 altered to meet the requirements of certain changes in the 
 
 possible that Aristophanes alludes to the new bronze coinage issued the year 
 before the Frogs was acted {Hist. Num. 314). No such base gold coins of 
 Athens are known, and as her gold coins are of excellent quality, it is better 
 to refer them with Head to 394 B.C., the period of her restored prosperity, when 
 Conon and Pharnabazus brought aid from the great king. 
 
374 THE ROMAN SYSTEM. 
 
 bronze series. Thus the Etruscan silver staters of the period 
 prior to 350 B.C., which weigh 130 grs., are marked X, whilst 
 the coins of the same weight at a later epoch are marked XX, 
 showing that the copper unit had undergone a change. This 
 Soutzo thinks was simply a reduction from the triental to the 
 sextantal foot, and in no wise due to any change in the relative 
 value of silver and copper. That however both influences may 
 have aided in the change will be made clear from the history of 
 the reduction of the Eoman denarius and as in the second 
 Punic war. Finally when the Romans coined their first denarii 
 in 268 B.C., the lihella or tenth of the dena,rius, which repre- 
 sented in silver the copper libra, was only 7 grs., an indubitable 
 proof that the as was but then a mere fraction of its former 
 self. Yet all the same it is clear that this silver deimrius, which 
 represented a reduced decussis of bronze, had its ultimate 
 source in nothing else than the 10 libral asses which repre- 
 sented the value of a sheep. Are we not then justified in 
 suggesting that the Etruscan stater of 135 grs. marked X had 
 a like origin, that the 10 litra piece or noummos of Tarentum 
 of almost the same weight, and the Syracusan 10 litra piece 
 of 135 grs., had also a similar origin, whilst at an earlier period 
 10 Aeginetic obols (the nomi of the poems of Epicharmus and 
 Sophron) were the equivalent of the same animal ? Ten nomi 
 were the price of a calf in the time of Epicharmus, and as we 
 have seen already the value of a sheep and a young calf is 
 always about the same, even down to the present day. 
 
 Roman System. 
 
 Although it is not our concern to go into the history of 
 Roman money, it is nevertheless necessary to give the reader a 
 short sketch of its principal features in order to make the 
 history of the Roman weight standards intelligible. 
 
 First came oxen and sheep, which according to their age and 
 sex bore definite relations to each other, and by which all other 
 values were measured. From an early period (at least 1000 B.C.) 
 copper was in use, not yet however weighed, but estimated 
 
THE ROMAN SYSTEM. 375 
 
 by the bulk, as I have already described. Side by side with it 
 ingots of gold and silver passed from hand to hand. Such ingots 
 are mentioned by Varro under the name of bricks (lateresy. 
 Though this mention refers to a later period, we can yet infer 
 from it with certainty that the practice of trafficking in small 
 ingots of gold and silver prevailed in Italy as elsewhere. With 
 gold came the art of weighing, which was also applied to silver. 
 We have given reasons for believing that the weight-unit 
 employed was the same as that which I have termed the ox-unit. 
 We found the Etruscans, the close neighbours of the Romans, 
 and who had access to the gold fields of Upper Italy, employing 
 this unit as their standard from the commencement of their 
 coinage in the oth century for both gold and silver. Any of 
 the towns of Southern Italy which struck gold, such as Meta- 
 pontum, coined on the same standard, which was likewise 
 employed for silver, sometimes a little reduced, by many com- 
 munities, such as Tarentum. The standard ingot of gold would 
 bear a known relation to that of silver, to the bar of bronze, 
 the cow, and the sheep. We have given absolute proof of the 
 relation between cattle and bronze in the 5th cent. B.C., and we 
 may well infer similar constant relations between cattle and 
 bronze, and the other metals. With greater exactness in com- 
 mercial dealings the bronze rod was next weighed by the standard 
 already in use for gold, and it was found that each of the 
 12 parts or unciae into which it was divided weighed just three 
 times the ox-unit, that is, the weight of the small talent which 
 we have found likewise in Macedon, Sicily, and Lower Italy, 
 and which may have itself represented originally the con- 
 ventional value of a slave, which was three cows among the 
 Celts, the close kinsfolk of the Italians, and probably about 
 the same among the early Greeks. As soon as the rods or 
 asses were exchanged by weighing, they would quickly lose 
 their original form, which was only required so long as it was 
 necessary that they should be of certain fixed dimensions. 
 Under the new system it mattered not whether an as was 
 
 1 Varro ap. Non. p. 356 nam lateres argentei atque aurei primum oonflati 
 atque in aerarium conditi. Lateres is used in this sense by Tacitus, Annals, 
 XVI. 1. 
 
376 THE ROMAN SYSTEM. 
 
 ■8 inches long, and three inches thick, provided only it was of 
 full weight when placed in the scale. These are the pieces 
 which are known as aes rude ; as yet they are mere lumps of 
 metal, without any stamp or device. Gaius well describes this 
 stage : " For this reason bronze and the balance are employed 
 (in mancipatio) because formerly they only employed bronze 
 coins, and there were bars (asses), double bars (dupondii), half- 
 bars (semisses) and quarters (quadrantes), nor was there any 
 gold or silver coin in use, as we can learn from a law of the 
 Twelve Tables, and the force and power of these coins depended 
 not on their number but on weight. For as there were bars 
 (asses) of a pound weight, there were also two pound bars 
 (dupondii), whence even still the term dupondius is used, as if 
 two in weight'. And the name is still retained in use." The 
 half-bars likewise and quarters were no doubt proportionately 
 adjusted to weight. It will be observed that the omission of 
 all mention of the decussis as a standard seems to throw 
 additional doubt on Mr Soutzo's hypothesis. The plain fact 
 is that a mass of bronze ten pounds in weight would have been 
 extremely cumbrous and unhandy for purposes of manufacture 
 into the implements of everyday life. 
 
 When and by whom a stamp was first placed on the bars, 
 it is of course impossible to say. Tradition however seems 
 unanimous in assigning it to the Regal period. Pliny's account 
 of the Roman coinage is as fellows'*: "King Servius first 
 stamped bronze. Timaeus hands down the tradition that afore- 
 time they employed it in a rough state at Rome. It was 
 stamped with the impressions of animals (nota pecudum), 
 whence it was termed pecunia. The highest rating in the 
 reign of that king (Servius) was 120,000 asses, and accordingly 
 this was the first class. Silver was struck A.iT.c. 485 (b.c. 268) 
 in the Consulship of Q. Ogulnius and C. Fabius, five years 
 before the first Punic war, and it was enacted that the denarius 
 
 1 Gaius I. 122. This passage is unhappily corrupt. The Verona MS. runs 
 
 asses librales erant et dupondii unde etiam dupondius. As dupondius is 
 
 really a masculine adjective used as a noun, a masculine noun must be under- 
 stood, this can only be as. Dupondius then is simply a two-pound bar. 
 
 3 xxxin. 3. 13. 
 
THE BOMAN SYSTEM. 377 
 
 should pass for ten pounds of bronze, the quinarius for five, and 
 the sestertius for two and a half. Now the libral weight was 
 reduced in the First Punic war, as the state could not stand the 
 expenditure, and it was appointed that asses of the weight of a 
 sextans (2 unciae) should be struck. Thus there was a gain of 
 five-sixths, and the debt was cleared off. The type of that 
 bronze coin was on the one side a double Janus, on the 
 other a ship's beak, whilst on the trieris and qiiadrans there 
 was a ship. The qiiadrans was previously termed a teruncius 
 from tres vmciae (three ounces). Afterwards under the pressure 
 of the Hannibalic wars in the dictatorship of Q. Fabius 
 Maximus, asses the weight of an ounce were coined, and it 
 was enacted that the denarius should be exchanged for sixteen 
 asses, the quinarius for eight, the sestertius for four ; thus the 
 state gained one half Nevertheless in the soldiers' pay the 
 denarius was always given for ten asses. The types of the 
 silver were higae and quadrigae (two-horse and four-horse 
 chariots), hence they were termed higati and quadrigatiK By 
 
 Pig. 56. Eomano-Campanian Coin. 
 
 and by in accordance with the Papirian law half-ounce asses 
 were struck. Livius Drusus when tribune of the Plebs alloyed 
 the silver with an eighth part of bronze. The Victoriatus 
 
 Fig. 57. Victoriatus. 
 
 1 Before striking silver at Bome the Bomans had struck silver coins with 
 type of quadriga and EOMA in Campania. Hence it is that Pliny regarded 
 these the quadrigati and bigati as the oldest issue instead of the coins with the 
 Dioscuri (Pig. 54)- The Hga came next, after it the genuine Roman quadriga. 
 
378 THE ROMAN SYSTEM. 
 
 was struck in accordance with a law of Clodius, for previously 
 this coin brought from Illyria was treated as merchandize. 
 It was stamped with a Victory and hence its name. The 
 gold piece was struck sixty-two years after the silver on such 
 a standard that a scruple was worth twenty sesterces, and 
 this on the scale of the then value of the sesterce made 900 
 go to the pound. Afterwards it was enacted that 1040 should 
 be coined from gold pounds, and gradually the emperors reduced 
 the weight, most recently Nero reduced it to 45." 
 
 This statement of Pliny is supported in various details by 
 several disjointed passages of Varro and Festus. Thus the 
 former says that " the most ancient bronze which was cast was 
 marked with an animal {pecore notatumy, and elsewhere he says 
 that the ancient money has as its device either an ox, or a sheep, 
 or a swine V' a statement repeated by Plutarch and other later 
 writers. Festus {s.v. grave aes) says "aes grave was so called 
 from its weight because ten asses, each a pound in weight, made 
 a denarius, which was so named from the very number (i.e. deni). 
 But in the Punic war, the Roman people being burdened with 
 debt, made out of every as which weighed a pound (ex singulis 
 assihus lihrariis) six asses, which were to have the same value 
 as the former." We have also a statement in the fragment of 
 Festus (4, p. 347, Mtiller) that afterwards the asses in the 
 sestertius were increased {i.e. to 4 from 2^), and that with the 
 ancients the denarii were of ten asses, and were worth a 
 decassis, and that the amount of bronze (in the denarius) was 
 reckoned at xvi asses by the Lex Flaminia when the Roman 
 people were put to straits by HannibaP. Again, Festus says : 
 " Asses of the weight of a sextans (two ounces) began to be in 
 use from that time, when on account of the Second Punic war 
 which was waged with Hannibal, the Senate decreed that out 
 of the asses which were then libral (a pound in weight) 
 
 1 Varro, iJ. E. ii. 1. 9. 
 
 2 Varro ap. Non. p. 189 aut bovem aut ovem aut vervecem habet signum. Pro- 
 bably uerrem, not ueruecem, is the true reading, since Plutarch says that the coins 
 were marked with an ox, a sheep or a swine (jSoO;/ ivexA-parTov fl irpd^aTov ij Sj/). 
 Popl. 11. 
 
 ' Festus fragm. p. 347 Miiller s.v. Sextantari asses. 
 
THE ROMAN SYSTEM. 379 
 
 should be made those of a sextans in weight, by means of which 
 when payments began to be made, both the Koman people 
 would be freed from debt, and private persons, to whom a debt 
 had to be paid by the state, would not suffer much losa.^." 
 
 Fig. 58. Sextans (Aes Grave). 
 (The two globules mark the value.) 
 
 Varro likewise is worth hearing: "In the case of silver the term 
 nummi is used : that is borrowed from the Sicilians. Denarii 
 (were so named) because they were worth ten (coins) of bronze 
 each, quinarii because they were worth five each, sestertius, be- 
 cause a half was added to two (for the ancient sestertius was 
 a dupondius and a semis). The tenth part of a deiiarius 
 nummus is a lihella, because it was worth a libra of bronze in 
 weight, and being made of silver was small. The semhella 
 is half the lihella, just as the semis is of the as. Terun- 
 cius is from tres unciae ; as this is the fourth part of the 
 lihella so the quadrans is the fourth part of the as.'' 
 
 As so much difficulty and controversy surround the various 
 questions connected with the beginnings of Roman currency, I 
 have thought it best to give at full length the scanty data afford- 
 ed by the ancient authorities. Let us now state the principal 
 facts revealed by those extracts. (1) The Romans in the Regal 
 epoch employed aes rude, but according to the testimony 
 of Timaeus (an Italian Greek historian who wrote about B.C. 
 300), they had already before the days of the Republic 
 stamped bronze with figures of cattle. (2) Silver was first 
 coined five years before the beginning of the First Punic war : 
 (3) Some time during that war the as was reduced from a 
 pound to two ounces; (4) In the Second Punic war under 
 like circumstances the as was reduced from two ounces to one 
 ounce; (5) The denarius when first struck represented ten 
 
 1 V. 173 Miiller. 
 
380 THE ROMAN SYSTEM. 
 
 libral asses, or a decussis ; (6) In the Second Punic war when 
 the as was reduced, the denarius was ordered to pass for 16 
 instead of 10 asses; (7) In spite of this reduction, the denarius 
 continued to be regarded as containing only 10 asses when 
 employed in paying the soldiers. 
 
 Considerable numbers of asses and the parts of asses have 
 come down to us, many of them bearing marks of value as before 
 described. There is undoubted evidence of a constant reduction 
 of the as. The question arises, did the reduction take place 
 per saltum or by a gradual process ? Mommsen thinks that the 
 as continued to be of libral weight until shortly before 264 B.C. 
 and that it was then without any intermediate steps reduced to 
 the triens (4 ounces). Mr Soutzo on the other hand maintains 
 with vigour that from 338 B.C., the date at which he fixes the 
 first coinage of asses at Rome, to 264 B.C., the degradation was a 
 gradual process, and he arraigns Mommsen on a charge of disre- 
 garding the ancient authorities, who state, as we have seen, that 
 the change was from libral to sextantal asses. Mr Soutzo is thus 
 compelled to state that all the asses within that period (338 — 
 264 B.C.) although they have a range from almost full libral 
 weight to only 3 ounces were treated as libral asses. Now this of 
 course is a very reasonable hypothesis on the principle which I 
 have adopted that bronze money was in fact merely token cur- 
 rency, used only for local circulation and not for extraneous trade. 
 But Mr Soutzo is precluded fi'om adopting such a position unless 
 he gives up the basis of his whole work. He has laid down that 
 the bronze money was not a mere conventional currency, but 
 always was actual value for the amount which it represented. 
 On this assumption he obtains his relation of 1 : 120 between 
 copper and silver. Assuming that the sextantal reduction was 
 contemporaneous with the issue of the first denarius (which is 
 in direct defiance of the historians), he found that the denarius 
 of 70 grs. = 2 ounces (840 grs.) of bronze ; therefore silver was 
 to bronze as 120 : 1. Again, when the financial crisis took place 
 during the Second Punic war and the denarius was reduced (as 
 we learn from the actual coin weights) to 62 grs., and it was made 
 to pass for 16 asses instead of 10 asses, he finds that since 62 grs. 
 of silver = 16 asses of 432 grs. {uncial) silver was to bronze as 
 
THE ROMAN SYSTEM. 381 
 
 112 : 1. But in the latter case he omits to explain why it was 
 that the denarius in pa}dng the troops only counted {or ten asses. 
 It is evident that if the relation between copper and silver was 
 really as 1 : 112, there could have been no need for making this 
 difference. But as the soldiers were serving outside Rome, and 
 Roman local token currency would not be taken in payment, it 
 was necessary to pay them according to the market value of 
 bronze. At Rome the denarius was made to pass for 16 asses, or 
 three-fifths more than its actual value. It appears therefore 
 that the data given us by Pliny are not sufficient to allow us to 
 come to any definite conclusion as regards the relative value of 
 silver and bronze at that time. Moreover there is no evidence 
 to show that the denarius was reduced from 70 grs. to 62 grs. 
 by the Lex Flaminia. It is on the whole more likely that this 
 reduction took place when the first gold coinage was issued (62 
 years after the first silver) in 206 B.C., since there was every 
 inducement to make such a change in the silver as would admit 
 of a convenient relation between the gold scruple and 20 
 sestertii. This again raises just doubts as regards the accuracy 
 of Mr Soutzo's calculation. With reference to the reduction of 
 the as to the sextantal standard we have seen that the truth of 
 his deductions rests entirely on the assumption that the degrada- 
 tion took place before the First Punic war at the same time as 
 the issue of the first silver coinage. This of course is directly 
 contradicted by the historians. But even granting that it was 
 correct, it is difficult to see why we should assume that the 
 Roman as, which according to Soutzo's own principles had been 
 nothing more than a token, should suddenly have been treated 
 as though it really was of the actual value which it represented. 
 There was no reason why, even though the unit of account was 
 the sextantal as, the as should have been anything else than a 
 token in its relation to the silver currency: certainly it is 
 strange that, if the Romans after treating the as as a token down 
 to 268 B.C. then suddenly gave it its full monetary value, they 
 did not continue to carry out their new principle. For as a 
 matter of fact there are very great differences in the weight of the 
 sextantal asses, and after the reduction to the uncial standard, 
 the same process of degradation went on without ceasing, as 
 
382 THE ROMAN SYSTEM. 
 
 Soutzo himself has shown \ All these facts point to the con- 
 clusion that the bronze coinage at Rome was only a local 
 token currency, such as is our own silver and bronze series at 
 the present day. 
 
 Let us now see if we can give a consistent explanation of the 
 statements of the ancient writers which I have quoted above. 
 Aes rude or bronze in an unstamped or unmanufactured state 
 was originally in use at Rome, according to Timaeus. This 
 period corresponds to that time when, as I have endeavoured to 
 show, asses or bars of given dimensions intended to be made 
 into articles for use or ornament passed from hand to hand, as 
 do the brass rods mentioned above at the present moment in 
 the Congo region of Africa. Then came the stamping of the 
 asses towards the close of the regal period (according to 
 Timaeus), when figures of animals were placed thereon. We 
 have seen above (p. 354) that such figures are actually found on 
 certain rough quadrilateral pieces of bronze found in some parts 
 of central Italy. With the use of weight instead of measure 
 for appraising their value, the shape of the asses would become 
 modified, getting shorter and thicker. Finally, they assume 
 the round shape of ordinary coins, and bear certain well-defined 
 symbols on both sides, such as the Janus head and Rostrum on 
 the as, that of Mercury on the sextans. But as few of these 
 round asses are found to weigh more than 10 unciae, it would 
 seem that the process of degradation had already set in before 
 their issue. Gold and silver at the same epoch passed by 
 weight either after the ancient fashion in ingots, or as the 
 coined money of the Greek cities of the South or of the 
 Etruscans. The unit of account continues to be the as of 
 full weight. Thus all penalties due to the state would be paid 
 not in reduced asses of only 5 or 4 ounces, but in full libral 
 asses as weighed in the balance. On the other hand although 
 reduced asses were used by the state in paying debts to private 
 individuals, they were only received as tokens, and no doubt the 
 state was bound if called upon to pay a full pound of bronze for 
 
 ^ Deux. Partie p. 41. " Le poids normal de I'as oneial est de 27 gr. 25, maia 
 il alia en a'affaiblissant progressivenient du commencement 4 la fin de la 
 periode, " 
 
THE ROMAN SYSTEM. 383 
 
 every stamped reduced as presented to it, but in ordinary times 
 this made no practical difference, for the bronze currency was 
 purely local all over Italy and Sicily, as we have seen above. 
 It was far too cumbrous to be used as a medium of international 
 trade. 
 
 When the Romans after defeating Pyrrhus and taking 
 Tarentum had reduced all Southern Italy and hence obtained 
 great quantities of silver, they proceeded five years before the 
 beginning of the First Punic war to issue silver denarii or 
 ten as pieces. Are these pieces real representatives of the as 
 of account, or do they rather simply represent the value of the 
 then normal as of currency, which was probably not more than 
 a triens or four ounces or perhaps not more than a quadrans or 
 three ounces ? The latter is the more likely hypothesis. They 
 had been long accustomed to a bronze token currency, and it 
 was most likely that the new silver currency would be adapted 
 to it. It is then likely that the denarius equalled ten asses of 
 at least 3 ounces each, in which case silver was to bronze as 
 180 : 1. In transactions inside the state the balance would 
 be commonly, and in dealing with strangers invariably, 
 employed in all monetary transactions, ancient states being 
 very jealous of alien mintages. This is exemplified by Pliny's 
 statement that the Victoriates brought from Illyria were treated 
 simply as merchandize. Then came the First Punic war, which 
 lasted for two-and-twenty weary years, during which the 
 resources of the Republic were almost drained dry. The state 
 became virtually a bankrupt and simply paid in modern 
 phraseology 3s. 4d. in the pound. It was effected thus : up 
 to the present the as of full weight was the unit of account, 
 although the coined asses had by this time come to be simply 
 tokens of about 2 ounces each. The state accordingly enacted 
 that the as of currency should become the unit of account, and 
 paid the state debt by these coins, and at the same time made 
 it legal for private individuals, who were bound under the old 
 order of things to pay their debts in libral asses, to discharge 
 their obligations by sextantal asses. Thus Pliny is perfectly 
 right in saying that the state made a profit of five-sixths. The 
 influx of silver after the conquest of Southern Italy and the 
 
384 THE ROMAN SYSTEM. 
 
 requirements of large quantities of bronze for the building 
 of fleet after fleet, and for military equipment, may have 
 very well tended to appreciate the value of bronze at this 
 period. As the reduction in the size of the as continued, 
 though the unit of account was two ounces, under the pressure 
 of the Second Punic war they repeated the same process. The as 
 was now not more than an ounce, so they decreed that the as 
 of currency should again be the as of account, and the state 
 thus gained a half, this time paying ten shillings in the pound. 
 
 The ounce and libra had been long well defined at Rome 
 before the silver coinage first appeared, and whilst we saw that 
 the sextula or one-sixth of the uncia was the lowest weight 
 employed for bronze, the fourth part of this weight, the 
 scriptulum, had been regularly employed in weighing silver 
 and gold ; as we have seen it owed its origin to the fact that 
 the Aeginetan silver obol was found to be about the weight of 
 the 24th part of an uncia or inch of bronze. The first denarii 
 were the weight of a sextula or 4 scriptula (70 grs.) of the older 
 weight. The scriptulum and sestertius were thus identical, 
 and hence in later days the unit of account was the sestertius 
 and not the as. Accordingly when the gold coinage of 206 B.C. 
 was issued, it was based on the scruple, and consisted of pieces 
 of 1, 2, and 3 scruples. 
 
 We have now traced the origin of Roman currency suffici- 
 ently for the purposes of this work. After various fluctuations 
 in the weight of the gold pieces under Sulla, Pompey, Julius 
 Caesar and others, Constantine the Great finally fixed the 
 
 Fig. 59. Gold Solidus of Julian II. (the Apostate). 
 
 weight of the aureus or solidus at 4 scruples in 312 A.D., and 
 so it remained until the final downfall of the Empire of the 
 East in 14.53. From this famous coin the various mintages of 
 
THE ROMAN SYSTEM. 385 
 
 mediaeval and consequently of modem Europe may be said to 
 trace their pedigrees. The solidus was divided into thirds 
 or tremisses, for the scrupular system had been abandoned, the 
 solidus being regarded simply as a sextula or one-sixth of the 
 uncia, and not as a multiple of the scruple. The tremissis 
 
 Fia. 60. Gold Tremissis of Leo I. 
 
 therefore weighed 24 grs. Troy, or 32 wheat grains. When the 
 barbarian conquerors of the Koman Empire began to coin 
 silver they took as their model the gold tremissis. In the 
 earliest stage of the Anglo-Saxon mintage we find so-called 
 gold pennies of 24 grs. occasionally appearing. These are 
 nothing else than tremisses. But silver henceforward was to 
 form for centuries the staple currency of Western Europe, and 
 the silver penny of 24 grs. (whence comes our own penny- 
 weight) became virtually the unit of account. As its weight 
 shows, the penny was based on the gold tremissis. 
 
 The first regular coinage of gold in Western Europe began 
 with the famous gold pieces of Florence in the beginning of the 
 14th century. These weighed 48 grs. or 2 tremisses. From their 
 place of mintage the name florin (fiorino) became a generic term 
 for gold coins. Accordingly when Edward III. issued his first 
 gold coins of 108 grs. each, although differing so completely 
 in weight from their prototype, they too were called florins. 
 In reality however Edward's coin was 1^ solidus (T2 -|- 36). 
 The first attempt did not prove satisfactory, and with the issue 
 of the famous noble, first of 136 J grs., and afterwards of 129 grs., 
 the series of English gold coins may be said to begin, of which 
 the latest stage is the sovereign of 120 J grs. Troy. 
 
 I have already explained at an earlier stage the origin of 
 
 the Troy gi-ain ; before we end let me add a word on the origin 
 
 of the Troy ounce. The Troy pound like the Roman has 
 
 12 ounces, but whereas the Roman ounce had 432 grs. Troy or 
 
 P. 25 
 
386 THE ROMAN SYSTEM. 
 
 576 grs. wheat, the Troy ounce has 480 grs. Troy or 640 grs. 
 wheat. How came this augmentation of the ounce ? 
 
 It is in Apothecaries' weight that we find the key. This 
 standard runs thus 
 
 20 grs. = 1 scruple, 
 3 scruples = 1 drachm, 
 8 drachms = 1 ounce, 
 12 ounces = 1 pound. 
 
 Now note that there are 24 scruples in the ounce, and 
 288 scruples in the pound, exactly as in the Roman system. 
 But there is an element foreign to the old Roman system as 
 seen in the drachm of 60 grs. Now Galen and the medical 
 writers of the Empire used the post-Neronian denarius of 60 grs. 
 as a medicine weight. What more convenient weight unit 
 could be employed than the most common coin in circulation ? 
 The drachma and denarius had long since been used synonym- 
 ously in common parlance. But as there were 18 grs. (Troy, 
 24 wheat grs.) in the old scruple, and there were 60 grs. in the 
 drachm or denarius, they were not commensurable, and accord- 
 ingly to obviate this difficulty the physicians for practical 
 purposes raised the scruple to 20 grs., in order that it might 
 be one-third of the drachm. The number of scruples in the 
 ounce remaining 24 as before, the ounce became augmented by 
 48 grs. (24 x 2) and accordingly rose to 480 grs. We saw 
 above that the Troy grain is the barley-corn. Why is the 
 latter so closely connected with ' Troy weight ' ? When the 
 scruple was raised from 18 grs. Troy, 24 grs. of wheat, to 
 20 grs. Troy, it no longer contained an even number of wheat 
 grains, for the new scruple contained 26| grs. wheat. As this 
 was inconvenient, and on the other hand the new scruple 
 weighed exactly 20 barley-corns, the latter henceforth became 
 the lowest unit of this system. 
 
CONCLUSION. 387 
 
 Conclusion. 
 
 It now simply remains to sum up the results of our enquiry. 
 Starting with the Homeric Poems we found that although 
 certain pieces of gold called talents were in circulation among 
 the early Greeks, yet all values were still expressed in terms of 
 cows. We then found that the gold talent was nothing else 
 than the equivalent of the cow, the older unit of barter, and we 
 found that the talent was the same unit as that known in 
 historical times under the names of Euboic stater or Attic 
 stater, and commonly described by metrologists as the light 
 Babylonian shekel. Our next stage was to enquire into the 
 systems of currency used by primitive peoples in both ancient 
 and modem times, and everywhere alike we found systems 
 closely analogous to that depicted in the Homeric Poems, and 
 we found that in the regions of Asia, Europe and Africa, where 
 the system of weight standards which has given birth to all 
 the systems of modern Europe had its origin, the cow was 
 universally the chief unit of barter. Furthermore gold was 
 distributed with great impartiality over the same area, and 
 known and employed for purposes of decoration from an early 
 period by the various races which inhabited it. We then 
 found that practically all over that area there was but one unit 
 for gold, and that unit was the same weight as the Homeric 
 Talanton. Next we proved that gold was the first object for 
 which mankind employed the art of weighing, and we then 
 found that over the area in question there was strong evidence 
 to show that everywhere from India to the shores of the Atlantic 
 the cow originally had the same value as the universally 
 distributed gold unit. 
 
 From this we drew the conclusion that the gold unit, which 
 was certainly later in date than the employment of the cow as 
 a unit of value, was based on the latter ; and finally we showed 
 that man everywhere made his earliest essays in weighing 
 by means of the seeds of plants, which nature had placed ready 
 to his hand as counters and as weights. Then we surveyed the 
 theories which derive all weight standards from the scientific 
 
 25—2 
 
388 CONCLUSION. 
 
 investigations of the Chaldeans or Egyptians, and having found 
 that they were directly in contradiction to the facts of both 
 ancient history and modem researches into the systems of 
 primitive peoples, we concluded that the theories of Boeckh 
 and his school must be abandoned. 
 
 Next we proceeded to explain the development of the 
 various systems of antiquity from our ox-unit, taking in turn 
 the Egyptian, Assyrio-Babylonian, Hebrew, Lydian, Greek and 
 Italian. New explanations of the origin of the Talent and 
 Mina and also of the earlier types on Greek coins and of the 
 varieties of standard employed for silver by the Greeks were 
 offered, and finally in dealing with the systems of Sicily and 
 Italy arguments were advanced to show that the Roman as was 
 originally nothing more than a rod or bar of copper of definite 
 measurements, and was in weight and method of division the 
 same as the Sicilian Litra and the Greek Obol. 
 
 In how far the propositions here put forward have been 
 proved, it must remain for others to decide. 
 
 l,au» IBto, ^ax Fibts, 
 IRequieg JWortuts. 
 
APPENDIX A. 
 
 The Homeric Trial Scene. 
 
 KeiTo S' ap h /i^jffoijn Siu xpvoio TaXavra, 
 Tif BS/iev, 8s fiera Toiffi SIktiv WivTora etiroi.. 
 
 II. XVIII. 507—8. 
 
 I WOULD not return to so well-worn a theme, were it not that 
 editors like Dr Leaf [ad loc.) still state that there is nothing in the 
 language of the last line to hinder us from taking it either of the 
 litigant or of the judge. 
 
 Scholars have fixed their attention so closely on the words Sikijv 
 eiTTot that they have completely overlooked the qualifying IdvvTaTa. 
 In modern courts of law we do not expect to hear the straightest 
 statement of a case from advocates, but rather from the judge. 
 The ancient Greek would never dream of expecting a litigant to 
 give a straight statement of his case. The following passages will 
 show that iOv^, WvveLv, eWvveiv, 6p66i are always applied to a judge 
 (the converse ctkoXio's being used of unjust judges). The metaphor 
 is from the carpenter's rule (cf. iTrl (TTa.6ii.-qv Wvveiv Od. v. 245). 
 
 Pind. Pyth. IV. 152 koX Opovo?, u ttote iyKadL^iav KpTjOdhas in-TroTats 
 evdvve Aaois StKas. 
 
 Solon 3. 36 ev6vv(av cTKoXtas StKas. 
 
 II. XVI. 387 01 (Siy €iv dyopy tr/coXicts KptvoXTi GiixuTTa^. 
 
 Hesiod 0pp. 221 <tko\v^<s 8e StKjjs Kpivaa-i. Oip-UTTw;. 
 
 Hes. 0pp. 222 {^[ki]) KaKov dvOpioTroicri <f>£pov(Ta 
 
 01 T£ fJI.LV i^€X.OL<X(l)(Tl KOL OVK 16 ilo-V eViLft.aV. 
 
 Arist. Bhet. I. 1 ov yap Set rdi/ SiKaa-rrjV Sia(TTpe(j>eiv eis opyyjv 
 irpoa.yovra'i rj (f^Oovov ^ IXeoi' • op,oiov yap Kav tt Tts, <S //.eWtt ^pijcr^at 
 Kavovi, TOVTOV TTOLijcreie orpeySXcv. 
 
 Pind. Pyth. XI. 15 6p6oSCKav yas 6fi(f>aX.ov. 
 
 Aesch. Persae 764 evOwTr/piov vrKrJTrrpov. 
 
890 APPENDIX A. 
 
 No one can then doubt that the words SiK-qv lOvvTara eijrot can 
 only refer to the judge. 
 
 The following account of a trial on the Gold Coast so well 
 illustrates the principle of payment having to be made to the judges 
 that I think it worth quoting. {Eighteen years on the Gold Coast of 
 Africa, by Brodie Crookshank, Vol. I. p. 279, London, 1853.) 
 
 " When the day arrived for the hearing of Quansah's charge, a 
 large space was cleanly swept in the market-place for the accommo- 
 dation of the assembly; for this a charge of ten shillings was made 
 and paid. When the Pynins (elders) had taken their seats, sur- 
 rounded by their followers, who squatted upon the ground, a 
 consultation took place as to the amount which they ought to 
 charge for the occupation of their valuable time, and after duly 
 considering the plaintiff's means, with the view of extracting from 
 him as much as they could, they valued their intended services 
 at £6. 15s., which he was in like manner called upon to pay. 
 Another charge of £2. 5s. was made in the name of tribute to the 
 chief, and as an acknowledgment of gratitude for his presence upon 
 the occasion. £\. 10s. was then ordered to be paid to purchase rum 
 for the judges, £1 for the gratification of the followers, ten shillings 
 to the men who took the trouble to weigh out the different sums, 
 and five shillings for the court criers. Thus Quansah had to pay 
 £12. 15s. to bring his case before this august court, the members of 
 which during the trial carried on a pleasant course of rum and palm 
 wine." 
 
APPENDIX B. 
 
 What was the Unit of Assessment in the Constitution 
 
 OF SeRVIUS TULLIUS? 
 
 Th. Mommsen in his Roman History (i. 95—96 English Trans.) 
 has laid down that land was the basis of assessment, on the 
 analogy of the Teutonic hide. He makes the members of the 
 First Class those who held a whole hide; and the remaining four 
 classes were made up of those who held proportionally smaller 
 freeholds. When Mommsen has once spoken, it is presumptuous 
 to raise doubts. If however it can be shown that the Italians 
 rather based their assessments on cattle, and that furthermore the 
 statements of the later historians point to an original rating which 
 harmonizes well with such an' original condition, it may have 
 been worth while to start enquiry once again in a case where 
 the data are so scanty and obscure. 
 
 Pliny H. N. xxxiii. 3. 13. Maximus census cxx. assium 
 fuit illo rege, ideo haec prima classis. This is confirmed by Festus 
 {s.v. infra censum, p. 113 Miiller) infra classem significantur qui 
 minore summa quam centum et viginti millia aeris censi sunt. 
 
 Livy I. 42 says the rating of the prima classis was Centum 
 millia aeris, of the secunda classis was infra centum assium ad 
 quinque et septuaginta millia. Tertia classis quinquaginta millia, 
 Qua/rta classis, quinque et viginti millia. Quinia classis, undecim 
 millia. 
 
 Dionysius of Halicarnassus (iv. 16 — 17) puts the rating of the 
 1st class at 100 minae (of silver) or 10,000 drachms; of the 2nd at 
 75 minae, of the 3rd at 50 minae, of the 4th at 25 minae, and that 
 of the 5th at 12 minae. 
 
 All are agreed that it is absolutely incredible that the original 
 rating of the first class was 120,000 li^ral asses of bronze. The 
 
392 APPENDIX B. 
 
 cow was worth 100 lihral asses at Eome in 451 b;c. Therefore the 
 rating of 120,000 asses would have been equivalent to 1200 cows. 
 It is impossible to believe that there could have been a numerous 
 body of men in early Rome possessed of such vast capital. Boeckh's 
 explanation is that with the reduction of the as from its original 
 weight of a libra to two ounces, and one ounce, there was a 
 corresponding raising of the amount of the rating of the several 
 
 Mommsen on the other hand thinks that the rating was 
 originally on land, and that the change in the method of rating 
 from land to bronze took place at a time when land had greatly 
 risen in value, and that accordingly 120,000 asses of the First Class 
 are libral asses. Such a change as Mommsen supposes must have 
 taken place before 260 — 241 b.c., for the as was reduced to two 
 ounces during the first Punic "War. Yet we cannot easily suggest 
 any period before that date when there was likely to have been so 
 great a rise in the value of land, as is necessary to account for 
 the large rating of 120,000 asses, which according to Mommsen's 
 reckoning would be worth about 400 lbs. of silver (or according to 
 Soutzo 1000 lbs. of silver). 
 
 Boeckh's hypothesis seems to fit better the conditions of the 
 problem. Much of the importance of the rating of the various 
 classes passed away when Marius (104 B.C.) changed the whole 
 military system and chose the troops from the Capite censi, as well 
 as from the five property classes. 
 
 The as had been reduced to a single uncia in the 2nd Punic 
 War (cf. p. 377). Thus 12 asses of the uncial standard were 
 required to make up the weight of the old libral as. Accordingly 
 120,000 asses of the 2nd century B.C. would be equal to 10,000 
 libral asses of the earlier days. But as by the Lex Tarpeia 100 
 asses is the value of a cow, 10,000 libral asses =100 cows. This 
 would be by no means an unlikely number of cows, to form the 
 minimum of the wealthiest class of a pastoral community. There 
 is another curious piece of evidence which seems to confirm my 
 hypothesis. One of the provisions of the Licinian Rogations 
 (367 B.C.) was that no one should hold more than 50Q jugera of the 
 Public Land, or should be allowed to feed more than one hundred 
 large cattle or 500 small cattle on public pastures. fjLtjhh/a ex^iv 
 TrjaSe t-^s yrjs irkiOpa TrevTaKO(Tiu>v TrXct'ova, fj.r]8e irpo^aTeveiv iKarov 
 7rA.Ei(0 TO jxdtflva koX irevTaKotritov ra eXacrcrova. Appian, Bell. Civ. I. 8. 
 
APPENDIX B. 393 
 
 If 100 large cattle were the number which qualified a Eoiuan for 
 the first class, there was every reason why Licinius and Sextus 
 should have taken 100 as the maximum number of cows which a 
 citizen could keep on the public pastures. 
 
 Next I shall show that the method of rating by cattle and 
 not by land was that actually practised in Sicily. That island 
 stood in such close relations to the Italian Peninsula both geo- 
 graphically and ethnologically that we may reasonably infer that 
 the method of rating in use there was also in use in Italy. 
 
 Now we learn from Aristotle's Oeconomica (ii. 21) that when 
 the tyrant Dionysius oppressed the Syracusans with excessive 
 exactions, they ceased to keep cattle : 
 
 Ta)r Se ttoXitoJv 8to ras citr^opas ov Tpe^ovTwv jSocrKijfiaTa, elirev on 
 iKava yjv an™ Trpos to<tovtov' tous ovv vvv KTrjcra/iivovi ciTeXets ecrea-Oai, 
 TToWtSv 8e Tttxii KTr]a-afi,iviov 7roX\a ^otTKrujaTa, <Js arekyj. I^oVtcov, Ittv, 
 cucTo Kaipov elvai, rt/iifcrao-^ai KeXeiJo-as iTre/SaXe TtXos, k.t.X. 
 
 If the citizens of Syracuse, a great Greek trading city, were still 
 rated in cattle in the time of Dionysius (405 — 367 B.C.), d, fortiori 
 we may expect the same primitive method of assessment to prevail 
 among the pastoral peoples of Central Italy in the 6th and 5th 
 centuries B.C. 
 
 Among the Kelts, the close kinsfolk of the Italians, the same 
 system probably prevailed. Thus in the ancient Irish laws, where 
 the various classes of freemen are described, there are a number of 
 them called £o-aires\ cow-freemen. 
 
 As modern research has shown that everywhere among the 
 Aryans land was originally held in common, and that separate 
 property in land sprung up only at a comparatively late period, we 
 may with some confidence infer that in Italy likewise in early days a 
 man's wealth was reckoned in his cattle, and not in lands, such as I 
 have shown to have been the practice among the Greeks of the 
 ' Homeric times ' (' The Homeric Land System,' Journal of Hellenic 
 Studies, 1885). 
 
 1 Ancient Laws of Ireland, Vol. i. p. 61. O'Curry, Manners and Customs of 
 the Ancient Irish, Vol. i. pp. 100 seq. 
 
APPENDIX C. 
 
 Keltic and Scandinavian Weight Systems. 
 
 It is always dangerous to deal with things Keltic. So much 
 difficulty is there in getting at any facts amidst masses of wild 
 assertions and loose conclusions, that a prudent man may well shrink 
 back. However, as it is worth while to give some facts respecting 
 the actual weights of gold rings and other ornaments, I have thought 
 it best to print the following pages. 
 
 Attempts have long ago been made to find the standard of the 
 so-called ring money. Sir William Betham, followed by John Lind- 
 say \ after weighing many examples, arrived at the conclusion that 
 they are based on the ounce Troy. Now as the ounce Troy is 
 entirely unknown to the Brehon Laws, and was only brought into 
 Ireland by the English settlers, it is needless to argue further 
 against that doctrine. Dr Petrie's^ discussions about Irish coins are 
 similarly vitiated by his treating as Troy grains the grains of wheat 
 mentioned by the authorities. 
 
 1. Irish. Let us work back from the known to the unknown. 
 The system in the Brehon Laws is as follows : 
 
 1 Cumhal (ancilla) = 3 Cows. 
 
 1 Cow = 1 Unga (uncia of silver). 
 
 1 Unga = 24 Screapalls. 
 
 1 Screapall = 3 Pinginns. 
 
 1 Pinginn = 8 grs. of wheat. 
 
 Unga= 576 grs. of wheat. 
 
 ' Survey of the Coinage of Ireland, p. 3. 
 
 2 Ecclesiastical Architecture of Ireland, p. 213 seqc[. 
 
APPENDIX C. 
 
 395 
 
 The ounce seems to be the highest unit of weight, and just as in 
 the Brehon Laws an tmga of silver is equated to a cow, so in early 
 times an unga of gold seems to have been the regular value of a 
 slave, the most valuable of living chattels. At least we may so infer 
 from a curious story of St Pinnian of Clonard : 
 
 Life of St Finnian (op Clonard, Co. Meath). 
 
 (Book of Lismobe, fol. 24 b, c.) 
 
 Tainic iar sin Finnen ou Cilldara oo 
 Brighit, ou m-bui io tiaohtuin leiginn 
 oous proioepta fri re. Ceilebrais iar sin 
 do Brigit ocus dobreth Brighit fainne 
 oir dho. Nir 'bho santach som imou 
 saegul : ni roghabh in fainue. " Ce no 
 optha," ar Brigit, "roricfea a leas." 
 Tainic Finnen iar sin cu Fotharta Air- 
 brech. Dorala uisce do. Eoinnail a 
 larnha asin uscii; tue lais for a bliais 
 asau uisci in ftinne targaidh Brighit 
 d6. 
 
 Tainic iar sin Caisin, mac Naemain, 
 CO faelti moir fri Finden. Ocus oone- 
 adhbair fein d6 oous roacain fris r6 
 Fotharta io cuinghidh oir fair ar a 
 shaeire. " Cia m6t," ar Finnen, ' ' oon- 
 aidheas? " "Noghebhudh uingi n-oir," 
 ar Caisin. Eothomthuis s6 iar sin in 
 fainne [oous frith uingi oir 2] ann. 
 Dorat Caisin hi ar a shaeriri. 
 
 1 Polio Sic. 
 
 2 The bracketed words are interlined in a 
 recent liand; but the final word shows that 
 they were a portion of the text. 
 
 Teanblation. 
 "After that came Finnian to Eildare 
 to Brigit and he was engaged in teach- 
 ing and preaching for a time. He 
 takes leave afterwards of Brigit and 
 Brigit gave a ring of gold to him. He 
 was not covetous regarding the world: 
 he accepted not the ring. " Though 
 thou refusest," said Brigit, "thou wilt 
 require it. " Finnian came after that to 
 Fotharta Airbreoh'*. [On his way] he 
 met water. He washed his hands with 
 the water [and] brought on his palm 
 from out the water the ring that Brigit 
 offered to him. 
 
 After that came Caisin, son of Nae- 
 mau, with great joy to [visit] Finnian. 
 And he oiiered himself to him and 
 complained to him that the king of 
 Fotharta was demanding gold from 
 him for his liberation. " How much," 
 said Finnian, "asketh he?" "He 
 would accept an ounce of gold," said 
 Caisin. He [Finnian] weighed after 
 that the ring (and there was found an 
 ounce of gold^) in it. Caisin gave it 
 for his liberation." 
 
 3 Near Croghan Hill, in the north of King's Co. 
 
 4 See note on Irish text. 
 
 I am indebted for this valuable reference, which also enables us 
 to form an idea of the relative value of gold and silver in early Ire- 
 land, to the Rev. B. Mac Oarthy, D.D., of Youghal. 
 
 But there is another weight called crosoch (crosog or crosach), 
 found in the most ancient poems. For instance in Cuchulaind the 
 
396 APPENDIX C. 
 
 brooch of Queen Medbh, "My spear brooch of gold which weighs 
 thirty ungas, and thirty half ungas, and thirty crossachs and thirty 
 quarter [crossachs]." (O'Curry, Manners and Customs, Vol. in. p. 
 102.) The weight of a crosoch we learn from a gloss quoted by 
 O'Donovan (Supplement to O'Reilly's Dictionary) from MS. R. I. A., 
 No. 35, 5. 49. 
 da pinginn agas cetrime pinginne isin lacht caerach i, cros6g^. 
 
 " Two pinginns and a fourth of a pinginn are a milk of a sheep, 
 i.e. a crosog." Since 1 pinginn = 8 grs. wheat therefore a crosog = 
 18 grs. wheat or 13-5 grs. Troy. 
 
 There are accordingly 32 crosochs in the unga of the Brehon 
 Laws. 
 
 Inspection at once shows that the crosoch must have belonged to 
 a different system, on which either the system of ungas and screa- 
 palls was grafted or vice versa. The expulsion of the crosoch from 
 the later Irish shows that the first alternative is the true one. 
 
 Again, it is certain that the unga and screapall were borrowed 
 from the Roman system, probably before the time of Constantine, 
 as after his time the solidus became universal throughout the Empire, 
 and has left its impress everywhere. 
 
 The crosoch therefore must be non-Roman, i.e. belong to the 
 native population. 
 
 Above we saw that it was used along with ungas and half ungas 
 in describing Medbh's Fibula. Here is historical evidence of its use 
 in the weighing of gold ornaments. 
 
 There were certainly 32 crosochs in the ounce of the Brehon 
 Laws, but if we can show in another system of north-western 
 Europe a weight exactly the same as the crosoch, with an ounce 
 which is its thirty-fold, we may hesitate to lay down that the full 
 Roman ounce with its 432 grs. Troy (576 grs. wheat) was the 
 earliest form of Irish unga. 
 
 There is no mention of screapalls in the weight of Medbh's 
 brooch. It is quite possible that under ecclesiastical influences the 
 full Roman ounce and its division into screapalls may have been 
 introduced at a comparatively late period. The contact between 
 Kelts and Scandinavians in early times has of late excited much 
 interest. 
 
 ' O'Donovan haa omitted caerach of the MS. 
 
APPENDIX C. 397 
 
 2. Let us now turn to the old Norse system. It is as follows : 
 
 1 pening = 13-5 grs. Troy 
 
 10 penings = 1 brtug = 136'7 grs. 
 
 3 brtugs = 1 ore = 410 grs. 
 
 8 ores = 1 mark = 3280 grs. 
 Let us deal first with the mark. As its name signifies, it in all 
 probability was originally not a weight, but a measure. The use of 
 mark as a land measure is well known in the Teutonic languages. 
 It is also used as a measure of length. Thus a mark of cloth 
 consists of 448 alen or ells. After what we have learned about 
 the history of the Roman as (p. 354) we need not be surprised 
 if a term originally used as a measure of some article which was 
 not as yet sold by weight, came in similar fashion to be in- 
 corporated at a later period into the weight system as a higher 
 unit. If the mark was originally a given measure of bronze or iron, 
 we can readily see how it came later on to be used as a weight, 
 and ultimately to be the chief unit of account among our Anglo- 
 Saxon forefathers, until it was at last driven out by the pound. 
 
 That silver was cast into bars which weighed a mark is rendered 
 highly probable by the fact that three of the silver bars found 
 at Cuerdale weigh respectively 3960, 3954, and 3950 grs. Troy ; 
 that is, just the weight of 160 pennies of the reign of Alfred. 
 160 pennies are two-thirds of a pound of 240 pennies, or in other 
 words a ma/rh. 
 
 The practice of running silver into ingots of such a weight may 
 well have arisen from an earlier practice of employing bronze or 
 iron bars of such a weight. It is at all events certain that the 
 mark is native Teutonic and is not borrowed from Rome. That the 
 Kelts at least used bars of iron as money is made not unlikely by a 
 famous passage of Caesar which I shall quote later on. A various 
 reading states that the Britons used iron rods as money {/erreis 
 taleis). Even without this we may reasonably infer from what we 
 have learned of the practice of primitive peoples in dealing with 
 iron or copper, that the Teutons and Kelts must have used 
 these by measure. It is well known that the Swedes used ingots 
 of copper as currency down to comparatively recent times. It 
 is then most likely that the ore or ounce of 410 grs. was the 
 highest original weight unit, just as the uriga is in the ancient 
 Irish system. The weight of this ore is of great interest. If 
 we found the Roman pound of 12 ounces in Scandinavia, we should 
 
398 APPENDIX C. 
 
 at once say that the ore of 410 grs. was the reduced Roman ounce 
 (432 grs.). But as the native mark evidently got its position 
 before the influence of Rome was felt in the North, we may well 
 consider the ore to be pre-Roman. The reader will remember that 
 I identified the ancient Roman uncia with the small talent of 
 Sicily and Macedonia. The latter weighed 3 ox-units or about 
 405 grs. I also suggested that it originally represented the value 
 of a slave, and was thus the original highest unit used for gold 
 or silver. I showed on an earlier page (141) that the Norse iirtug, 
 the one-third of the ore, was the price of a cow. If three cows 
 were the price of a slave in Scandinavia as they were in Ireland, 
 and probably in Homeric Greece, an ore of gold was the price 
 of a slave. The passage from the life of St Pinnian given at once 
 shows that an ounce of gold was the regular price of a slave 
 in early Ireland, and probably a good Scandinavian scholar could 
 soon find similar evidence for the value of the old Norse slave. 
 
 The meaning and derivation of the term ortug have been much 
 discussed. It occurs in the forms ortog, ortug, ertog, oertug. 
 Cleasby's Lexicon makes nothing out of the first part of the word, 
 but takes the second part (-tog -tug = tugr = 20), because ortug 
 had the value of 20 penningar, though tugr means 10. But as 
 a matter of fact there were, as we saw above, 240 penningar in 
 the mark, and therefore there were 10 penningar in the ortug. 
 Holmboe^ goes more deeply into the origin of ortug. He says, "As 
 d, pi. mr, signifies a ewe, and tug-r as a derivative of ten both by 
 itself and in compounds signifies ten, ertug seems originally to have 
 signified 10 ewes, just as the weight ertug betokens the weight of 
 10 peningar, and peningr itself also means a sheep. It may be 
 regarded as questionable to assume the plural cer to form the first 
 part of the compound, yet oer must at an early period have been 
 used in the formation of compounds, since both the folkspeech 
 of Norway has the form cer-saud-ewe, sheep, technically a ewe-withr- 
 lamb, and the folkspeech of Denmark has cer lam in the sense of 
 ewe-lambV Another suggestion is that iirtug comes from arta = a 
 Tpeii-formed knob, so that ortug = brtu-vog, the weight of a pea. 
 
 The objection to this would be that the pea would weio-h 
 13-5 grs. Troy, which seems far too much. 
 
 In spite of the philological difficulty in making ortug =10 ewes 
 
 1 Norges Mynter, iv — v. 
 
 2 I am iudebte4 to Mr E. Magniisson for the translation of Holmboe, 
 
APPENDIX C. 399 
 
 it is very remarkaHe that this value corresponds so accurately with 
 the value of a cow, which I independently found for it. I have 
 already pointed out that 10 sheep were the usual value of a cow. So 
 it was at Eome in 451 B.C. and so it is with the Modern Ossetes. 
 The ox fit for the yoke was probably worth 20 lambs or 5 sheep in 
 Lusitania', and as we saw that in the "Welsh Laws the ox when fit for 
 the yoke was worth half a full-grown cow, the Lusitanian cow was 
 worth 10 sheep. So also at Athens, when Plutarch^ says an ox was 
 worth 5 sheep, he probably means an ox fit for the yoke, the cow being 
 worth 10 sheep. In the Brehon Laws 8 sheep go to the cow, but as 
 I have already pointed out the insulated position of Ireland would 
 tend to cause a variation in prices from those on the mainland of 
 Europe. Thus we see from the story of St Finnian that gold must 
 have been worth only three times its weight in silver in Ireland in 
 the early centuries of our era. For the price of a slave was 
 an ounce of gold, whilst in the Brehon Laws it is 3 ounces of silver. 
 It might be said that we cannot prove that this was the value of 
 a slave in gold and silver at any one time, and that silver may 
 have been much cheaper at an earlier date. When we recollect 
 that silver has never existed in any quantity in Ireland, and that 
 where it does exist it can only be obtained by systematic mining, a 
 thing impossible in the eternal turmoil of Ireland, and also bear in 
 mind that when Japan was opened to Europeans in this century 
 gold was exchanged for three times its weight in silver, we need not 
 think such a relation at all unlikely in ancient Ireland. The paucity 
 of silver ornaments in the Royal Irish Academy Museum confirms 
 this opinion. But the evidence from the Penitentials shows that 
 silver was scarce at a comparatively still early date in Ireland ^ 
 Thus XII altilia vel XIII sicH praetium unius cuiusque ancHlae. 
 
 I have already shown the universality of making gold ornaments 
 after a fixed weight. The passages given above show that a similar 
 practice existed among the ancient Irish. 
 
 Let us turn to the numerous gold rings, commonly called Ring 
 Money, of which there are some 50 in the Museum of the Royal Irish 
 Academy of various weights and sizes. I give these weights. Let 
 us examine them, and see if we can find any indications gained 
 inductively of a weight standard. 
 
 1 Polybius XXXIV. 8. 
 
 2 Solon 23, see p. 324 swpra. 
 
 3 Wasserschleben, Die Bussordnungen d. Abendlandisch. Kirehen (De dis- 
 putatione .Hibernensis Sinodi et Gregori Nasaseni sermo), p. 137, 
 
400 
 
 APPENDIX C. 
 
 As by inspection we see that the smallest rings weigh 13 and 
 14 grs. Troy, and the next three 29, 31, 32 respectively, which look 
 like the double of the smaller, I shall group the rings according 
 as they approximate to the multiples of 15. 
 
 Multiples 
 of 15 
 
 Actual Ring WeigMs 
 (Royal Irish Acad.) 
 
 Multiples 
 of 15 
 
 Actual 
 
 Rings 
 
 Weights 
 
 15 
 
 13, 14 
 
 180 
 
 179 
 
 345 
 
 
 30 
 
 29, 31, 32, 36 
 
 195 
 
 199, 203 
 
 360 
 
 
 45 
 
 40,46 
 
 210 
 
 206, 209 
 
 375 
 
 372 
 
 60 
 
 54, 56, 58, 59, 61, 65, 65 
 
 225 
 
 220 
 
 370 
 
 
 75 
 
 69,73 
 
 240 
 
 247 
 
 
 
 90 
 
 84, 84, 88, 96 
 
 255 
 
 259 
 
 
 
 105 
 
 98, 104, 111 
 
 270 
 
 
 
 
 120 
 
 121, 124 
 
 285 
 
 283, 283 
 
 
 
 135 
 150 
 
 
 300 
 
 
 
 
 144, 144, 147, 147, 150, 151 
 
 315 
 
 322 
 
 
 
 165 
 
 171, 172 
 
 330 
 
 332 
 
 
 
 A glance at the foregoing table shows that the most numerous 
 group of rings occurs at the fourfold (60), no less than seven speci- 
 mens ranging themselves at that point, next we find six specimens 
 at the tenfold (150), whilst next in order comes the sixfold with four 
 examples. There are three cases of the double (30). On the other 
 hand it is worth noticing the absence of the ninefold, whilst there 
 are three instances of the sevenfold, and the absence of the eighteen- 
 fold (2 X 9) likewise, whilst we have the elevenfold, twelvefold, thir- 
 teenfold, fourteenfold. However from the absence of the twenty- 
 fold (2 X 10) we cannot lay great stress on this. The heaviest 
 specimen (372) closely approximates to the twenty-five fold (375). 
 
 I add the weights of the ancient Irish gold rings preserved in the 
 British Museum. 
 
 Irish small plain ring money. Some are without localities but 
 may he assumed to he Irish. Marked thus *. 
 
 *103, 563, *389, *121, *29J, 218, 224, 323, 295 injured, 218, 122, 90, 
 28, 56, 215 copper plated with gold (injured), 299, 148, 98, 366, 89 piece 
 
APPENDIX C. 401 
 
 cut from a larger bracelet ?, 48J hollow and open ? plating of bronze ring ? 
 (banded), 422, 410 (ounces), 288 (injured). 
 
 Irish flmed ring money. * No precise locality, hit presumably Irish. 
 *106, *123 (worn), 30, 59, 90, 66, 59^. 
 With disks, 249, 806 (2 oz.), 595, 283, 169, 665, 139, 119. 
 Dots, no lines, 32. 
 
 The weights of these rings show many points of agreement with 
 those in the Irish Museum. Thus we get 28, 29^, 30, and 32 grs. 
 corresponding to 29, 31, and 32 grs. of the second group in the Irish 
 Table. Again, 56 and 59J where we get .54, 56, 58, 59, 61 in the 
 Irish, and 66 corresponding to 65, 65 ; 98 to 96 and 98 ; and 89 
 corresponding to 88 and 90; 119, 121, 122 and 123 to 121 and 
 124; 139 to 144, and 144 and 148 to 147 and 147; then 169 to 
 171 and 172. Then comes a break, and we get 215, 218, 218, 224 
 corresponding to 220, and 249 to 247, and 283 to 283 and 283 ; 
 and 323 to 322, and 360 to 366. But the British Museum gives us 
 in the higher weights three very important specimens : for 410 grs. 
 is the ounce corresponding exactly to the old Norse ore of 410 grs., 
 and the ring of 422 grs. looks like the later ounce rising towards 
 the full weight of 432. The ring of 806 grs. is plainly 2 ounces of 
 the standard of 410 (806 h- 2 = 403). 
 
 The occurrence of several specimens so constantly all of the same 
 weight, as for instance those about 220 grs., points beyond doubt to 
 the conclusion that when the rings were being made a given quantity 
 of gold was weighed out for the purpose. The story of St Finnian 
 proves that for any transaction in which rings were employed as 
 money, the scales were employed. 
 
 There is a set of leaden weights in the Royal Irish Academy 
 Collection, found at Island Bridge, Dublin, in 1869, when Ancient 
 Irish and Scandinavian remains were found together. As they are 
 more or less corroded, it is not advisable to lay much stress on their 
 present weights. 
 
 1. 
 
 Semicircular weight 
 
 grs. 
 1852 
 
 2. 
 
 Animal's 
 
 head 
 
 
 1550 
 
 3. 
 
 Circular 
 
 
 
 1221 
 
 4. 
 
 
 
 
 958 
 
 5. 
 
 
 
 
 634 
 
 e. 
 
 Oblong 
 
 
 
 539 
 
 7. 
 
 
 
 
 459 
 
 8. 
 
 Quadrangular 
 
 
 414 (oz.) 
 
 9. 
 
 
 
 
 395 (oz.) 
 
 10. 
 
 
 
 
 220 
 
 R. 
 
 26 
 
402 APPENDIX C. 
 
 There are certainly some interesting points of agreement between 
 the weights and the gold ornaments, e.g. the weights of 220, 390, 
 414, 630, have corresponding weights in gold. The largest weight 
 may be 4f oz. of 410 grs. 
 
 Let us now return to the Irish monetary system, and see if we 
 can determine more accurately its relation to that of Rome. 
 
 8 grains of wheat = 1 pinginn. 
 24 „ „ = 3 pinginns = 1 screapall. 
 
 576 „ ,, =72 „ = 24 screapalls = 1 unga. 
 
 As regards unga and screapall we have spoken already. Of 
 their origin there is no doubt. The pinginn on the other hand is 
 not so easy. The name is certainly Teutonic, said to be ultimately 
 a loan word formed from pecunia. It seems to have been employed 
 as a general term for the smallest form of currency. Hence we 
 find the Saxon form (pendinga) applied to the 240th part of the lb., 
 and of about 32 grs. wheat, and the Norse peningr used for the 
 240th part of the mark, whilst in Ireland the cognate form is applied 
 to the 72nd part of the ounce, and is of the weight of 8 grains 
 wheat. 
 
 The Irish employed the system of Uncia and Scripula. Shall 
 we say then that this system was in vogue in Britain likewise 
 before the time of Constantine and yielded slowly before the later 
 one? 
 
 Since then it was common to the Kelts on both sides of the 
 Irish Sea, and we find that in Ireland it was grafted upon an earlier 
 system, of which the crosoch is a survival, we may reasonably infer 
 that the Kelts of Britain had likewise a native system analogous to 
 the crosoch. But further, of this we have strong evidence of two 
 kinds. Caesar £. G. v. 12, when describing the British Kelts and 
 their manners, says ; pecorum magnus numerus. Utuntur aut aere 
 aut nummo aureo aut annulis ferreis ad certum pondus examinatis 
 pro nummo'. The passage has been mutilated by Editors, but this 
 is the reading of the best MSS. Caesar thus tells us that they had 
 
 1 Beside the difficulty about nmno aureo there is a further variant between 
 anulis ferreis and taleis ferreis (bars of iron). Can Caesar have in reality 
 written both ? May the original reading have been : utuntur aut aere aut numo 
 aureo, aut aureis anulis, aut taleis ferreis etc. ? Caesar speaks of the Britons 
 having iron of their own, and it is highly probable that they employed ingots 
 or bars of it as money, as the wild tribes of Annam and Africa do at present. 
 They probably used their gold or bronze rings and armlets as money also. 
 
APPENDIX C. 403 
 
 a system of weights of their own. Secondly the evidence of the 
 actual British Coins (cf. Evans, Coins of Ancient Britons) which are 
 of a standard not Roman. 
 
 'Sow we have seen above that the Irish gold rings were weighed 
 on a standard of almost 1.3-5 grs. Troy. Let us now see if the 
 larger gold ornaments preserved in our Museums confirm or disprove 
 the evidence of the rings. I shall first give the weights of those 
 in the Royal Irish Academy : 
 
 ^Crescent shaped ornaments: 1539, 434 (ounce of Brehon Laws?), 
 733, 1008, 255, 2013, 489, 552, 660, 1081, 98, 432 (ounce of Brehon Laws), 
 339, 400 (early ounce = Norse OT-e?), 187, 390 (old ounce?), 797 (2 ounces, 
 2 X 398^). 
 
 The following are not in Wilde's Catalogue : 472, 505, 542, 540, 630, 647, 
 667, 687, 720, 722, 737, 1092, 4331. 
 
 Torques: 476, 1013, 1527, 3126, 3168, 4722, 5941, 6007, 10268. 
 Not in Wilde : 154, 342, 1946, 2715, 4172, 5207, 5275, 6012, 6881. 
 
 Armlets : 144, 158, 182, 329, 401 (small pre-Eoman ounce), 421 (ounce), 
 487, 510, 684, 757, 894, 989, 1037, 1369, 1630 (4 ounces of 407 grs.?), 1716 
 (4 ounces of 426 grs.?), 2089 (5 oz. of 418 grs.?), 5635 (14 oz. of 402 grs.?), 
 6265 (15 oz. of 417 grs.). 
 
 Not in Wilde: 130, 145 (J of oz. of 432 grs.?), 178, 184, 187, 
 199, 208, 215 (half oz. of 432 grs.?), 241, 289, 301, 303 (f oz. of 
 405 grs.?), 345, 396 (oz.?), 487, 509 (1} oz.?), 547 (IJ of oz.), 606 
 (l-i oz. of 405 grs.?), 630 (IJ oz. of 420 grs.?), 740, 753 (If oz.), 1093 (2i 
 oz.?), 1190, 1210 (3 oz. of 405 grs.), 1267 (3 oz. of 422 grs.?), 1322, 1641 
 (4 oz. of 410 grs.), 1730 (4 oz. of 432 grs.?), 1836, 1836 (4^ oz. of 410 grs.?), 
 1940 (5 oz. of 388 grs.? or 4f oz. of 410 grs.?), 1980 (5 oz. of 396 grs. or 4f 
 oz. of 410 grs.?), 2201, 6144 (15 oz. of 410 grs.?), 13557 (33 oz. of 410 grs.?). 
 
 Fibulae: 56 (4 crosachs), 179, 180 (f oz. of 400 grs.?), 415 (oz.), 600 (IJ 
 oz. of 400 grs.?), 1231 (3 oz. of 410 grs.), 1345 (3| oz. of 432 grs.), 1596 
 (4 oz. of 399 grs.?), 2301 (5| oz. of 400 grs.), 2536 (6 oz. of 422 grs.), 17200 
 (43 oz. of 400 grs.?), 8092 (20 oz. of 404 grs.), 19440 (48 oz, of 405 grs.). 
 
 Not in Wilde : 61, 106 (Joz.), 170, 170 (%oz. of 425gr.), 191, 196 (J oz.?), 
 207, 209 (i oz.), 248, 275 (§ oz. of 411 grs.), 315 (f oz.?), 379 (oz.), 542 
 (IJ oz.?), 557 (IJ oz.?), 586 (IJ oz.?), 649 (l^oz. of 432 grs.?), 1187 (3 oz. of 
 396 grs.?). 
 
 Gorgets: 1160 (3 oz. of 387 grs.?), 2020 (5 oz. of 404 grs. ?), 3091 (8oz. of 
 386 grs.?), 3444 (8 oz.of 430 grs.?). 
 
 1 These are taken from Sir W. Wilde's Catalogue, but for the weights of 
 articles acquired since 1862 I am indebted to the kindness of the Curator, 
 Major Maoenery. 
 
 26—2 
 
404 APPENDIX C. 
 
 The result of an examination of the foregoing weights is to 
 show that in all probability the vast majority of them were made 
 on a standard much lighter than the Roman ounce of 432 grs., 
 which was in full use in mediaeval Ireland. We saw that the 
 Roman ounce had been only 420 grs. down to the Second Punic war, 
 and I suggested that originally it was of the same weight as the 
 Sicilian talent 390 — 405 grs. Can we observe a similar increase in 
 the Irish ounce? The ounce of 400 — 410 seems to point to a time 
 when Kelt and Scandinavian had a common higher unit of similar 
 weight corresponding to the value of a slave ^, just as the Sicilian 
 and Macedonian talent of three ox units represented the same 
 slave unit. 
 
 I shall now give the weights of the various ornaments of gold 
 found in England, Wales and Scotland which are preserved in the 
 British Museum. For these I am indebted to the great kindness of 
 Mr P. L. Griffith of the Anthropological department. 
 
 Torques with rings. 
 
 Boxton, Suffolk, torque band twisted. 1 '038 (2J oz. of 415 grs.) with 
 double ring. Weight 24'8 grs. 
 
 (A ring of 8 parallel sections, bronze plated with gold, injured, weighs 
 111 grs. ; the locality is not known, but it seems connected with this class. 
 Probably Irish, one in Wilde's catalogue of 7 sections.) 
 
 Another double ring, Devonshire, weighs 563 grs. (1 J oz. of 420 grs,). 
 
 Lincolnshire torques ; 1454 grs. (3J oz. of 415 grs.), coiled band 119J. 
 Quadruple ring, 93J (J oz.?), another similar 93. 
 
 Cambridgeshire torques (not in B. M.) 1944 (5 oz. of 387 ? or 4| oz. 
 of 410), rest in B. M. viz. :— bracelet 613 (IJ oz. of 412 grs.), two treble 
 rings linked together, combined weight 358, double ring, weight 132 
 (J oz.), another 131J, two others similar but smaller are each 68 (^ oz.). 
 
 Wales. Two plain bracelets, near Beaumaris, Anglesea, 1028 (2| oz. 
 of 410 grs.) ; 420 (1 oz.), crescent-shaped gorget, Caernarvon, 2861 (7 oz. 
 of 410 grs.). 
 
 Scotland. Noard, near Elgin, torques formed of a plain twisted band, 
 207 (J oz.) : 215 (J oz.) : 192 (i oz.) : 119 grains. 
 
 The evidence points to an ounce of 420 grs. It is worth noting 
 that this is just 5 times the weight of the latest British coins, 
 84—82 grs. 
 
 1 My friend Mr F. Seebohm has shown me that as a weight the Swedish 
 Jungfrau is equal to the Irish Cumhal, 
 
APPENDIX C. 405 
 
 Whence then did the Britons obtain this pre-Roman standard 1 
 Was it of native development or borrowed from some other people ? 
 By Britons we must be careful to express not all the natives of 
 Britain. They fall most certainly into at least two groups. I. The 
 Kelts in the East and South East. II. The barbarous inhabitants 
 of the interior, who subsisted by hunting and fishing, and who were 
 probably of that Iberic race, which spread over all Western Europe 
 before the advance of the Aryans. It is only with the first 
 group that we are immediately concerned. They almost exclusively 
 possessed the art of coining, as is shown by the area over which 
 British coins are found. Furthermore Caesar tells us of the close 
 relationship of the first group to the Gauls, as is shown by their 
 tribal names, language and customs. In addition their coinage is 
 similar. Now there can be no doubt as regards the source from 
 whence the Gauls derived their coinage. As they got the art of 
 writing from the Phocaeans of Massilia (founded circ. 600 B.C.), so 
 likewise did they gain the art of money-stamping from the same 
 famous town, as has been completely demonstrated long since. 
 People are inclined at once to assume that the Gauls and Britons 
 got their weight standards also from Marseilles. There is certainly 
 some evidence to support this belief. Thus the gold torque lately 
 found in Jersey weighs 11500 grs., which is exactly the mina of the 
 Phocaic system at a time when 57^ grs. went to the drachm. 
 Again we have seen that there were a considerable number of gold 
 ornaments in Ireland and Britain which weigh 224 — 216 grs. 
 This is the Phocaic (or Phoenician) stater. But the question is not 
 so simple as it might appear at first sight in relation to the weight 
 system, as will appear most readily by a short survey of the history 
 of the monetary system of Massilia. 
 
 I. The earliest coinage consists of silver, small divisions of the 
 Phocaic drachm (58 — 54 grains Troy). These have various symbols 
 on the obverse, but have uniformly the incuse square on the reverse. 
 These may be placed after 500 B.C. " Notwithstanding their archaic 
 appearance, it does not seem that these little coins are much earlier 
 than the middle of the 5th century." 
 
 II. Next comes a series, chiefly obols for the most part with 
 head of Apollo on obverse, and a wheel on reverse, the latter 
 probably a development of the earlier incuse square. They are 
 mostly obols of 13 — 8 grains. 
 
 III. About the middle of the 4th century the draohm first 
 
406 APPENDIX c 
 
 appears -with the head of Artemis on obverse and a lion on the 
 reverse, weighing 58 — 55 grains. 
 
 Now over all Gaul, and far into Northern Italy, and the valleys 
 of the Alps, as far as the Tyrol, the coinage of Massilia made its 
 way and was abundantly imitated. In fact these imitations formed 
 the entire medium of those regions until the Roman conquest. The 
 imitations of the little coins with Apollo and the wheel as reverse 
 are found right into the north of France, and in England. 
 
 Did the Kelts borrow their 13^ grain unit from the 13 grain 
 obol of Massilia, or is it of far earlier growth ? The Etruscans used 
 a unit of 13^ grs. in the 4th century B.C., and we find the Massaliotes 
 having almost the same. Is the true answer this? All over Western 
 Europe the ox unit of 135 grs. of gold was subdivided into 10 parts 
 each of 13J grs. These 10 parts corresponded to 10 sheep, the 
 regular value of a cow. There was also a higher unit fi-om Greece 
 to Gaul and Britain corresponding to the slave. There were 
 fluctuations in their worth in various times and places, but on the 
 whole there was a tendency to raise the weight of the higher unit 
 (ounce). But it is natural that the Kelts may have taken over 
 into their system certain units from the Phocaic system which they 
 used as multiples of their own smaller units, just as the Teutonic 
 peoples took the Eoman pound into their own system, and the 
 natives of West Africa made the Spanish dollar the multiple of 
 their .own native weights, based on seeds. Some idea of the 
 relative ages of Keltic gold ornaments may perhaps be got from 
 applying the criterion of weight standard to them. 
 
INDEX. 
 
 Abdera, 340 
 
 Abraham, 112, 113, 197 
 
 Abrus, 172 
 
 Absalom's hair, 120, 275 
 
 Abyssinian gold in beads, 82 
 
 Actus, 365 
 
 Aegina, 211, 328 
 
 Aeginetan measures, 306 
 
 — obol, 366 
 
 — standard, 9, 21, 311 
 
 its origin, 217 
 
 used for copper, 345 
 
 ^ system, 307 
 
 Aelian, 144 
 Aes, 86 
 
 Aes grave, 378 
 Aes rude, 355, 376 
 Agariste, 212 
 Agathocles, 138 
 Agerept, 150 
 Agonistic types, 337 
 Agrigentum, 347, 350 
 Aicill, Book of, 353 
 Airgid, 63 
 Alalia, 130 
 Alamanni, 140 
 Alaska, 47 
 
 Alexander, 29, 198, 342 
 Alexandrine talent, 244 
 Alfred's penny, 180 
 Al-li-ko-ohik, 15 
 Alphabet, the, 227 
 Alps, gold of, 88 
 Altin( = gold), 70 
 Alyattes, 71 
 Amber, 227 
 
 — beads, 46 
 
 — golden, 110 ; red, 110 
 Anaxilas, 336 
 
 Angala, 354 
 
 Annals of Four Masters, 81 
 
 Annam, 23 
 
 — barter system of, 164 
 Ant coins, 22 
 
 Ants, gold-digging, 66 
 Apis, worship of, 50 
 Apollo, 107 
 
 Apulia, 370 
 Aquileia, 87 
 Arab weights, 179, 182 
 Arabia, gold of, 76 
 Archimedes, 36, 100 
 Argippaei, 68 
 Argos, 215, 335 
 Arimaspians, 66, 68 
 Aristaeus, 314 
 Aristeas, 108 
 
 Aristotle, 96, 106, 131, 138, 213, 318, 
 323, 336 
 
 — Polity of Athenians, 305 
 Armlets, 42 
 
 Arpi, 367 
 Arrows, 24, 43 
 Arrugia, 101 
 Artabri, 97 
 Arverni, 90 
 As, 350 
 
 — derivation of, 353 
 
 — divisions, 351 
 
 — land measure, 351 
 
 — linear measure, 351 
 
 — of empire, 362 
 
 — reduction of, 380 
 
 — sextantal, 362 
 
 — symbol of, 369 
 
 — used only of bronze, 351 
 As libralis, 135 
 
 Assam coinage, 177 
 
 Asser, 354 
 
 Asses, sacrifice of, 107 
 
 Assis, 354 
 
 Assurbanipal, 201 
 
 Assyrian weights, 183, 199, 249 
 
 Astronomy, 199 
 
 Asturia, 101 
 
 Astyra, 71 
 
 Aternian law, 134 
 
 Athene, statue of, 211, 220 
 
 Athenian coinage, 124, 306, 372 
 
 Athens, Polity of, 214, 305 
 
 Attic choeuix, 214 
 
 — didraohm, 5 
 Aulus Gellius, 135 
 Aura (old Norse), 63 
 
408 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Anr^s, 183, 254 
 Aurum, 87 
 Ausum (aurum), 61 
 Axe, 318 
 Axes, Tenedos, 50 
 
 — West African, 40 
 Aymonier, 23, 161 
 Aztec money, 192 
 
 — numerals, 192 
 Aztecs, 17, 59 
 
 Babylonian metric system, 251 
 
 — standard, 78, 163, 206, 261, 387 
 
 — system, 197 
 Bactria, coins of, 126 
 Baetis, 97 
 
 Bag of rice, 162 
 Bahnars, 23 
 Ball, v., 68 
 Balux, 101 
 
 Bamboo-joint, 163, 171 
 Bar, 39, 158 
 
 — (Assyrian), 185, 285 
 
 — of sUver, 25 
 Barley, 178 
 Barleycorn, 177, 179 
 
 — = Troy grain, 181 
 Barrel, 115, 175 
 Bars, 371 
 
 Barter, age of, 11, 114, 196 
 Bassak, 161 
 Baug-brotha, 37 
 Baugr, 37 
 Beaver, 314 
 
 — skin, 12, 153, 323 
 Beag, 37 
 
 Bear skins, 16 
 Bee, 320 
 Bekah, 277 
 Belgic tribes, 94 
 Bells, 43 
 Bereniceum, 297 
 Bermion, 71 
 Bes, 351 
 Betzer, 36 
 Bhasoara, 177 
 Bigae, 377 
 Bigati, 377 
 Bimetallism, 338 
 Bisaltae, 340 
 Blanket currency, 17 
 Bo, 33 
 Boar, 332 
 
 Boeokh, 1, 238, 365 
 Boeotia, 77 
 Boeotian shield, 331 
 Bonny Biver, 40 
 Boroimhe, 32 
 Bortolotti, 241 
 Bosman, 185 
 
 /3o0s iiri y\dj(TO-r], 8 
 
 Boyd Dawkins, 110 
 
 Bracelets, 35 
 
 Brahmegupta, 177 
 
 Brandis, 129, 195, 294 
 
 Brandy, 323 
 
 Brass rods, 41 
 
 Brassey, Lady, 330 
 
 Britain, gold coins, 93 
 
 ' Britons" money-system, 179 
 
 Bronze in Italy, 368 
 
 — in Northern Europe, 86 
 Brugsoh, 122, 195, 196 
 Buffalo, 24, 164 
 
 — value of, 154 
 
 — worth a stick of gold, 168 
 Buffaloes, 25 
 
 Bull, 322 
 
 — on coins, 321 
 BuU's-head weight, 282 
 Burgundians, 141 
 Bushel, 115 
 
 — how fixed, 191 
 
 Cacao seeds, 17, 193 
 
 Cadmus, 71, 227 
 
 Caesar, 179 
 
 Calculus, 192 
 
 Caldron, 25 
 
 Caldrons, Irish, 32 
 
 Caldwell, W. H., 152 
 
 Calf, 374 
 
 Calves' heads, 322 
 
 Camarina, 347 
 
 Cambodia, 25, 160 
 
 Cambridge, 182 
 
 Camirus, 339 
 
 Campania, 216 
 
 Candarin, 158 
 
 Cappadocae, 78 
 
 Carohemish, 202 
 
 Carmania, gold in, 74 
 
 Carob, 181 
 
 Carthage, 288 
 
 Carthaginian coinage, 131, 289 
 
 — gold unit, 130 
 
 — trade in gold with West Coast of 
 
 Africa, 83 
 Cartload, 175 
 Cash, 157 
 Cat's eyes, 21, 27 
 Cattle at Rome, 31 
 
 — chief wealth of Britons, Gauls, 
 
 Italians, etc., 51 
 
 — in Avesta, 27 
 Catty, origin of, 162, 174 
 Cauer, 365 
 
 Cayley, Prof., 231 
 Ceutupondium, 136, 360 
 Centussis, 370 
 Ceramus, 82 
 
INDEX. 
 
 409 
 
 Chabas, M., 239 
 Chabinus, 76 
 Chaloi, 346 
 Chalcis, 227, 361 
 XaXfc6s, 86 
 Chariot of Hera, 116 
 Chariots in Veda, 26 
 Charlemagne, 34 
 Charuz, 60 
 Chautard, 225 
 Chauter, 45 
 Chinese coinage, 10 
 
 — shell -money, 21 
 
 — weight-system, 156 
 Chios, 822, 343 
 Chisholme, 199 
 X/)U(r6s, 60 
 
 Ghrysus, 277 
 Cipeiro, 134 
 Ciiicia, silver of, 286 
 Cloth, 35 
 
 — silken, 22 
 Cuidus, 321, 322 
 Cocoanut, 162, 171 
 Coinage, invention of, 203 
 
 — of gold, 125 
 
 — of silver at Rome, 136 
 Coins, early Lydian, 298 
 
 — • normal weight of, 218 
 Coin-standards, 210 
 Colaeus, 62, 96 
 Colchis, 70 
 Colebrooke, 176 
 Colpaoh, 38 
 
 Commercial weights, 344 
 Comparetti, 314 
 Compensation for wounds, 30 
 Concha, 328 
 Conchylion, 329 
 Constantine, 384 
 Constantine's solidus, 181 
 Conti, Nioolo, 27 
 Convention, 47 
 Coomb, 115 
 Copper coins in Greece, 361 
 
 in Britain, 94 
 
 — in Greece, 312 
 _ in Meroe, 78 
 
 — in relation to gold, 77 
 
 — native, 58 
 
 — of Haidas, 17 
 
 — rings, 22 
 
 — standards, 348 
 
 — wire. Calabar, 40 
 Corcyraean wine jars, 106 
 Corinthian standard, 362 
 
 — system, 311 
 
 Corn sold by measure, 115 
 Cotton as money, 45 
 Counters, 192, 228 
 Coventry tokens, 336 
 
 Cow, 2 seqq., 370 
 
 — among Ossetes, 30 
 
 — at DeloB, 5 
 
 — at Syracuse, 31 
 
 — equal oentumpondium, 360 
 
 — Hebrew, value of, 148 
 
 — in Avesta, 26 
 
 — in Eig Veda, 25 
 
 — in Scandinavia, 35 
 
 — in Welsh Laws, 32 
 
 — names for, Sanskrit, Zend, etc., 61 
 
 — on coins of Eretria, 5 
 
 — suckling calf, 321 
 
 — unit of assessment at Home and 
 
 Syracuse, 398 
 
 — value of, in Gaul and Germany, 
 
 140 
 in Greece, Itsily, 133 
 
 — — at Rome, 135 
 in Scandinavia, 141 
 
 — — in Sicily, 137 
 
 Persian, 151 
 
 Phoenician, 143 
 
 (Table), 153 
 
 the same over wide area, 52 
 
 Cowell, Prof., 176 
 Cowries, 13, 177 
 
 — as counters, 229 
 Cows among Madis, 43 
 
 — in Darfour, 44 
 Crab's claw, 350 
 Crab's eyes, 186 
 Crawfurd, John, 170 
 Crenides, 74, 341 
 Croesus, 204, 297 
 Crosach, 36; oros6g, 396 
 Croton, 328 
 
 Cubit, royal, 265 
 Cucurbita, 258 
 Cumhal, 83 
 
 Cunningham, 55, 117, 127 
 Curtius, E., 201, 212 
 Cuttle-fish, 327 
 Cyathus, 258 
 Cyrene, 326 
 Cyzicene staters, 342 
 Oyzicenes, 301 
 Cyzicus, 316, 842 
 
 Damba, 186 
 Damleg, 45 
 Danes, 321 
 Danube, 106 
 
 — flows into Adriatic, 107 
 
 — source of, 107 
 Dapper, 43 
 Darfour, 44 
 Dario, 126, 277, 297 
 
 — as talent, 6 
 
 — derivation of, 300 
 
 ■ — = Homeric talent, 7 
 
410 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Datum, gold mines, 74 
 
 Debae, 75 
 
 Decalitron, 362 
 
 Decimal system, 203, 228, 371 
 
 in Homer, 308 
 
 Decussis, 856, 369, 370 
 Deeoke, 130 
 Degradation, 226 
 
 — of coin weights, 223 
 
 — of weight, 338 
 Delian priests, 108 
 Delphium, 106 
 Delos, 215 
 Demareteion, 297 
 Demeter, 327 
 Denarius, 367, 363 
 Deunx, 351 
 Dewarra, 20 
 Dextans, symbol of, 369 
 Dhalao, 330 
 
 Digitus, 353 
 Dinar, 63 
 Diodorus, 81 
 Dionysius, 31, 225 
 
 — of Halioarnassus, 134 
 
 — of Syracuse, 224 
 Dioscuri, 377 
 Dirham, 148, 182 
 Dodona, 215 
 Dodrans, 351 
 Dogs, 94 
 
 Dollar, Maria Theresa, in Soudan, 56 
 
 — Mexican, 24; Spanish, 44 
 Double Unit, 267 
 
 Doukha, 45 
 
 Drachm at Athens, 324 
 
 — Corinthian, 311 
 
 — origin of, 214, 310 
 Draco, 5 
 
 Dragon's eye, 22 
 Dublin, 321 
 Duck weight, 83 
 
 suggested origin, 247 
 
 Duck weights, 199, 245 
 Dungi, 248 
 
 Duodecimal system, 371 
 Dupondius, 376 
 Dyer, Dr Thiselton, 186 
 Dyrraohium, 322 
 
 Barring, 35 
 
 EbuBUs, coinage of, 290 
 
 Echinus, 328 
 
 Egypt, coinage of, 219 
 
 — gold in, 78 
 
 Egyptian gold-mines, described by 
 Diodorus, 79 
 
 — measures, 122 
 
 — Monad, 129 
 
 — records, 236 
 
 — weights, 122 
 
 Egyptian weight system, 237 
 Electrum, 98, 204, 290 
 
 — at Carthage, 289 
 
 — Lydian, 70, 294 
 
 — why coined, 207 
 Elephant, price of, 24 
 Elephant's tusk, 25 
 Ellis, 187 
 Emporiae, 290 
 English coinage, 224 
 
 — Imperial weights and measures, 
 
 266 
 
 — penny, 225 
 
 — weights, 186 
 Ephorus, 211 
 Epicharmus, 137, 364 
 Eretria, 322 
 Erman, 146, 242 
 Erytheia, 110 
 Eryx, 144 
 Esterlings, 225 
 Etrm-ia, 374 
 Etruscan gold coins, 180 
 
 — gpld unit, 359 
 
 — silver, 363 
 
 — standard, 180 
 Etruscans, 64 
 Etymology, danger of, 65 
 Euboic-Attio system, 811 
 Euboic standard, 9, 210 
 
 — — origin of, 222 
 Eustathius, 125 
 
 Evans, A. J., 271, 365, 366 
 
 — Dr J., 94 
 Exagium, 183 
 Ezekiel, 121, 282 
 
 Falgo, 45 
 
 Fanam, 173 
 
 Fee, 4, 34 
 
 Felkin, 43, 263 
 
 Fen Ditton, 182 
 
 Fertyt tribe, 46 
 
 Festus, 134 
 
 Fetiches, 187 
 
 Fibulae, 41 
 
 Fifteen-stater standard, 286 
 
 Fiji, 21 
 
 Fines, 13S 
 
 Fiorino, 385 
 
 Fish-hooks, 28 
 
 Florin, 885 
 
 Foot, Boman, 359 
 
 Foucart, 219 
 
 Fractions, 357 
 
 Frankincense, 6 
 
 Frazer, J. G., 30, 320 
 
 French metric system, 1 
 
 Fuel sold by bulk, 115 
 
 Gades, coinage of, 290 
 
INDEX. 
 
 411 
 
 Gaius, 8, 376 
 Galetly, A., 30 
 Gallaeoia, 101 
 Gardner, Dr, 126, 342 
 
 — P., 222, 313, 364 
 Gaul, 325 
 
 Gaulish gold unit, 131 
 Gauls, 332 
 
 — in Italy, 61 
 . — value of cow with, 140 
 Gaus, 51 
 Gelon, 142 
 Gerah, 277 
 Germans, 131 
 Geryon, 110 
 Gill, 23, 296 
 Gold, 57 seqq. 
 
 — alone weighed in Homer, 117 
 
 — among Salassi, 89 . 
 
 — at VeroeUae, 88 
 
 — bat, 163 
 
 — Coast, 105 
 
 — coinage, 372 
 
 — coinage, Athens, 124; Macedon, 
 
 125; Thasos, 125; Cyzious, 
 125 
 
 — coinage, Boman, 362 
 
 — coins, Athens, 372 
 
 — distribution of, 65 
 
 — equal distribution of, 114 
 
 — first coinage at Rome, 378 
 
 — first of all articles weighed, 114 
 
 — from India, 257 
 
 — in Baotria, 67 
 
 — in California, 58 
 
 — in China, 22 
 
 — in Gaul, 90 
 
 — in Meroe, 78 
 
 — in Noricum, 87 
 
 — in quiUs, 17, 186, 192 
 
 — in Eig Veda, 25 
 
 — in rings from Sennaar, 82 
 
 — in Swiss lake-dwellings, 85 
 
 — in Thibet, 66 
 
 — in Wales, 94 
 
 — measured, 168 
 
 — measured by quills, 186 
 
 — mining, methods of, 101 
 
 — not weighed, 187 
 
 — nuggets of, 75 
 _ of Tolosa, 92 
 
 — ornaments of Gauls, 92 
 _ Irish, 402 
 
 — placer, 98 
 
 — poured into jars, 259 
 
 — relation of, to silver in Etruria, 
 
 140 
 
 relation of, to silver and copper 
 
 in Italy, 139 
 
 — relative value, and silver, 75 
 
 — scarce in Greece, 221 
 
 Gold, standard, 211 
 
 — Talent of, 3 
 
 — unit, the same everywhere, 133 
 
 — unit of Attopoeu, 163 
 
 — units, table of, 132 
 
 — Ural-Altai, 67 
 
 — wedge of, 270 
 
 • — weighed in Veda, 122 
 
 — weighing, 167, 172 
 
 — white, 97 
 Golden Bough, 320 
 
 — Fleece, legend of, 70 
 Goliath, 120 
 
 Gortyn, 314 
 
 Gourds, 43, 258 
 
 Greek (old) standard, 306 
 
 — standard (table), 310 
 
 — system, 304 
 
 — weights, 181 
 Griffins, 68, 70 
 Guadalquivir, 97 
 Gunja, 176, 178 
 Gygadas, 206 
 
 Gyges, 71, 201, 204, 293 
 
 Hachachah, 45 
 Haddon, 105 
 Hair weighed, 275 
 Hakon the Good, 34 
 Haliartus, 334 
 Hamiloar, 289 
 Handfuls of rice, 170 
 Hanno, voyage of, 83 
 Hare, 336 
 
 — hunting of, 337 
 Hares at Carpathus, 337 
 Hare-skin, 13 
 Harich, 45 
 Harpoon, 105 
 
 Harris papyrus, 239 
 Hasdrubal, 289 
 Haxthausen, 4 
 
 Head, 130, 138, 196, 314, 316 
 Hebrew system, 269 
 
 — system, tables, 283 
 Hectae, 342 
 
 Hectare, 1 
 Helbig, 36, 84 
 HeUx, 86 
 Helvetii, 90 
 Heraclea, 865 
 Herakles, 107, 227 
 
 — road of. 111 
 Hercynian forests, 106 
 Herodotus, 107, 258, 260 
 Herondas, 842 
 
 Hexas, 348 
 
 Hide (of land), 891 
 
 Hides, 51 
 
 — as money, 832 
 Hierapolis, 202 
 
412 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Himera, 142, 347 
 Hindu weights, 177 
 Hiranya-pindas, 26, 258 
 Hissarlik, 73 
 Hittites, 202 
 
 Hoe money, China, Annam, 22 
 Hoes, 45, 165, 312, 371 
 Hoffmann, 36 
 
 Homeric Greeks, analogy of, to modern 
 barbarians, 50 
 
 — Poems, 2 
 
 — Trial Scene, 8, 389 
 Honey, 34, 122 
 Horapollo, 129 
 
 Horse, value of, 147 
 Hottentots, 42 
 Hucher, 131 
 Hultsch, 95, 129, 202 
 Hyksos, 50 
 
 Hyperborean maidens, 109 
 Hyperboreans, 107 
 Hyperooh^, 109 
 
 lalysus, 339 
 
 Iceland, 18 
 
 Icelandic proclamation, 18 
 
 lUyria, 378 
 
 Incas, weight, 193 
 
 Incuse on coins of Magna Graecia, 334 
 
 — square, 333 
 India, mediaeval, 27 
 Indian weight standards, 176 
 Ireland, gold in, 95 
 
 Irish currency, early, 31 
 
 — weights, 180, 401 
 Iron in Homer, 117 
 
 — ingots, 25, 163 
 
 — money, 373 
 
 — needles of, 27 
 
 — plates, 43 
 
 — rings, 40 
 Issedones, 68 
 Istir, 148 
 Istropolis, 107 
 Italian system, 350 
 Ivory tusks, 42 
 
 Jade, 48, 105 
 
 Janiform head, 318 
 
 Japanese Bean money, 295 
 
 Jars in Annam, 24 
 
 Jersey torque, 405 
 
 Job, 35 
 
 Jol, 288 
 
 Jones, Quayle, 186 
 
 Jordan, 112 
 
 Josephus, 277 
 
 Jugerum, 358 
 
 Juno Moneta, 215 
 
 Kaibel, 306 
 
 Karnak, 239 
 Kat, 238 
 Keller, Dr, 85 
 Kelts, 31 
 
 — their early knowledge of gold, 104' 
 Kenrick, 143 
 
 Kenyon, 306 
 Keseph, 270 
 Kesitah, 270 
 Kettle, 31 
 Kettles, 24 
 Kid, 33 
 
 Kikkar, 264, 279, 309 
 King's weight, 275 
 Klaproth, 69 
 Knife money, 156 
 Knives, 312 
 Koehler, 219, 317 
 Kolben, 43 
 
 Lacedaemonian shield, 334 
 
 Lachish, 268 
 
 Lady Godiva, 336 
 
 Lais, 380 
 
 Lake dwellings, 84 
 
 Lamb, 271 
 
 Laodioe, 109 
 
 Laos, weight system of, 161 
 
 Larins, 28 
 
 Lassen, 66 
 
 Lateres, 375 
 
 Latham, K. G., 57 
 
 Laurium, 99 
 
 — mines of, 59 
 Layard, Sir A. H., 85 
 Leake, Col., 313 
 Lebetes, 314 
 Lehmann, 195 
 Leinster, king of, 32 
 Lelantum, 222 
 Lemnos, 323 
 Lenormant, 129, 242 
 Leocedes, 212 
 
 Lex Flaminia, 378 
 
 — Tarpeia, 31 
 Libella, 357, 374 
 Libra, 347, 358 
 Lindus, 339 
 
 Linguistic Palaeontology, 60 
 Lingurium, Greek derivation of, 110 
 Lion and Bull, 296 
 
 — on coins, 321 
 
 — weights, 199, 245 
 Litra, 347 
 
 — its subdivisions, 348 
 
 — silver, 361 
 
 — translation of Ubra, 360 
 Litre, 1 
 
 L. M. E., 330 
 Load, 173, 263 
 
 — as unit, 172 
 
INDEX. 
 
 413 
 
 Load, Greek, 309 
 Lupinus, 278 
 Lusitania, 97 
 Lyoia, 332 
 Lydia, 201 
 Lydian coinage, 299 
 
 — coins, 321 
 
 — eleotrum, 296 
 
 — system, 293 
 Lynx, 110 
 Lyre, 329 
 Lysias, 301, 324 
 
 Macedonian standard, 346 
 
 — talent, 125, 304 
 Machpelah, 246 
 Madagascar, 187 
 Madden, 240 
 Madi tribe, 43, 263 
 Maine, Sir H. S., 8 
 Maize, grain of, 166 
 Makrizi, 182 
 Malay weights, 171 
 Malays, 309 
 
 Mana of gold, 26, 122 
 Mancipatio, 121, 358, 376 
 Mancus (of silver), 34 
 Maneh, its origin, 256 
 Mansous, 46 
 Manu, 177 
 Maris, 203 
 Mark, 358, 397 
 Marquardt, 181 
 Marsdeu, W., 172 
 Marseilles, inscription at, 142 
 Maseilia, 62 
 
 — court of, 111 
 Mathematical hangmen, 231 
 Measure of corn or oil, 324 
 Medbh, 36 
 
 Medimnus, 324 
 
 Melitaea, 323 
 
 Melkarth, 227 
 
 Men, 327 
 
 Mene, mene, tekel, upharsin, 247 
 
 Mennan, 33 
 
 Mentores, 106 
 
 Mermnadae, 205 
 
 Meroe, gold, copper, iron in, 78 
 
 Mesha, 272 
 
 Mesopotamia, cattle in, 50 
 
 Messana, 336 
 
 Metals, first objects to be weighed, 114 
 
 — relations of, in Greece, 219 
 
 — their discovery, 57 
 Metapontum, 319, 327 
 Metre, 1 
 
 Metric systems, 198 
 Midas, 71 
 
 Miletus, 205, 210, 226, 296 
 Milk of cow, 33 
 .- of goat, 33 
 
 Milk of sheep, 33 
 Millies, 157 
 Mill-sail incuse, 334 
 Mina, Greek, 309 
 
 — Hebrew, 274 
 
 — in Ezekiel, 284 
 
 — origin of, 258 
 
 — use of, 309 
 Mines of Spain, 97 
 Mithcal, 183 
 Moda, 46 
 Modius, 121 
 Moeun, 162 
 Mohurs, 35 
 Mois, 24 
 
 Mommsen, 88, 134, 205, 348, 364, 380 
 
 Money, development of, 48 
 
 Monro, D. B., 226 
 
 Moriae, 324 
 
 Moschus, 137 
 
 Moura, 160, 175 
 
 Movers, 143 
 
 Muk, in Annam, 24 
 
 Murex, 330 
 
 Mycenae, 72 
 
 — rings at, 77 
 Mytilene, 322 
 
 Naaman, 280 
 Nails, 159, 312 
 Naucratis, 241 
 Naxos, 348 
 Nehemiah, 280 
 Nejd, 29 
 Nero, 378 
 New Britain, 20 
 New Carthage, 289 
 
 mines of, 99 
 
 Niebuhr, 135 
 Nile, source of, 107 
 
 — water, 242 
 Nineveh, 85 
 Nissen, 195, 239 
 Nomads, 75 
 Nomisma, 366 
 Nomos, 369 
 
 — bronze, 367 
 
 — of Heraolea, 364 
 
 — Sicilian, 364 
 Noummos of Tarentum, 364 
 Nub (gold), 60 
 
 — its derivation, 78 
 Nubia, 78 
 
 Numerals on coins, 130, 363 
 Nummus, 131, 137 
 Numns, 364 
 
 Oats, 34 
 Ob, 349 
 Obol, 346 
 
 — Attic, Aeginetic, 346 
 
 — copper coin, 361 
 
414 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Obol, its subdivisions, 349 
 
 — origin of, 310 
 Oenone, 211 
 Olbia, 67, 316 
 Olive trees, 365 
 Olives, 324 
 Olympic victor, 324 
 Onoia, 348 
 Onesicritus, 74 
 Onions, 45 
 Oppert, 183 
 Oppian Law, 139 
 
 Or (gold in Irish), 61 
 
 Orang Glai, 25 
 
 Orchomenus, 72 
 
 Ordlach, 353 
 
 Ore, 397 
 
 Oman's threshing-floor, 148 
 
 Ortug, 397 
 
 Ossetes, 4, 30 
 
 Ostiaks, 4 
 
 Ostracism, 329 
 
 Ostrakon, 329 
 
 Owls, 225 
 
 Ox, fore part of, on coins of Samos, 313 
 
 — in Capitularium Saxonicum, 34 
 
 — name of coin, 4 
 
 — on coins of Eretria, 313 
 
 — value of, in Egypt, 146 
 Oxus, 204 
 
 Pactolus, 70, 206 
 
 Padi, 192 
 
 Paeonia, gold mines of, 74 
 
 Pahlavi texts, 148 
 
 Faille, 101 
 
 Palacrae, 101 
 
 Palae, 98, 101 
 
 Palestine, 269 
 
 Pallegoix, 161 
 
 Pangaeum, 71, 220 
 
 Panormus, 130, 289 
 
 Parkyns, Mansfield, 82 
 
 Parthenon, 310 
 
 PauU, 89 
 
 Pausanias, 212 
 
 Pea, scarlet, 172 
 
 Peach, 78 
 
 Pecunia, 4, 376 
 
 Pegasus, 362 
 
 Pendeo, 358 
 
 Pening, 397 
 
 Penny, its cognates, derivation, 64 ; 
 
 weight, 385 
 Pentacosiomedimni, 324 
 Pentonoion, 348 
 Pericles, 215 
 Perseus, 107 
 Persian Gulf, 27 
 
 — silver standard, 261 
 
 — standard, 300, 303 
 
 Persian tribute, 129 
 
 — wars, 220 
 
 — weights, 179 
 
 Persians coin money in Egypt, 219 
 
 Pertz, 141 
 
 Peru, 193 
 
 Petrie, W. M. P., 216, 240, 241, 258 
 
 Phanes, 320 
 
 Pharaoh, 113 
 
 Pheidias, 211, 310 
 
 Pheidon, 211, 311 
 
 Pheidonian weights, 218 
 
 Philip II., 74, 341 
 
 PhUippi, 74 
 
 Philippus stater, 140 
 
 tpXjopi, 61 
 
 Phocaea, 205, 322 
 
 Phocaean standard, 210 
 
 Phocaeans, 62, 96, 110, 130, 132 
 
 Phoenicia, 86, 200 
 
 Phoenician inscription of Marseilles,142 
 
 — standard, 206, 261 
 origin of, 286 
 
 — system^ 285 
 
 — weights, 201 
 from Jol, 288 
 
 Phoenicians, 117 
 Phtheirophagoi, 70 
 Picul, 263, 309 
 
 — origin of, 174, 190 
 Pig, 25 
 
 Pindar, 170, 211 
 
 Pinginn, 33 
 
 Pipilika, 67 
 
 Plutarch, 135, 378 
 
 Po, 110 
 
 PoUex, 353 
 
 Polo, Marco, 14, 146 
 
 Polybius, 62, 139 
 
 Polygamy, 54 
 
 Pondus, 358 
 
 Poole, E. S., 271 
 
 Posidonius, 91, 97 
 
 Pottery, in shape of gourds, 258 
 
 Pound, English, 266 
 
 — of 16 ounces, 18 ounces, 24 ounces, 
 
 360 
 
 — of silk, 259 
 Powell, 20 
 Priam, 71 
 Propontia, 210 
 Ptolemaic coinage, 299 
 
 — standard, 338 
 
 — stater, 279 
 Pump, Egyptian, 99 
 Pylus, 214 
 Pyrenees, 99 
 Pytheas, 257 
 
 — his voyage, 83 
 
 Qesitah, 270 
 Quadrans, 348, 352 
 
INDEX. 
 
 415 
 
 Quadrigae, 377 
 
 Queen Charlotte Islands, 17 
 
 Queensland blacks, 152 
 
 Queipo, 179, 200 
 
 Quills of gold, 17 
 
 Quincunx, symbol of, 369 
 
 Eakat, 172 
 
 Rameses II., 128 
 
 Eatti, 127, 176, 186 
 
 Eed Sea, 76 
 
 Eegenbogenschiisseln, 140 
 
 Eeindeer, 4 
 
 Eelation of gold to silver, to copper, 
 
 135 
 Rbegium, 336 
 Rhinoceros, horn of, 25 
 Rhoda, 290, 322 
 Ehodes, 132, 322, 339 
 Ehodian standard, 338, 339 
 Ehys Davids, 29 
 Eioe, 178 
 
 — bag of, 162, 172 
 
 — grains, 187 
 
 Eig Veda, 25, 59, 122, 257 
 Eing money, 35, 394 
 Rings, Egyptian, 242 
 
 — gold, 34, 128 
 of Egypt, 129 
 
 — in Homer, 36 
 
 — Mycenaean, 36 
 
 — of tin, 44 
 Eoad, sacred, 111, 216 
 Eobes, in Homer, 49 
 Eoman coins of Campania, 216 
 
 — foot, 359 
 
 — (later) weights, 181 
 
 — pound, 234 
 
 — system, 374 
 
 Eomans, use of weights by, 121 
 
 Eose, 320 
 
 Eotl, 46 
 
 Eoyal standards, 250 
 
 Eubat, 45 
 
 Ending, 180 
 
 Rupee, 4 
 
 — purchasing power of, 152 
 Rye, 34 
 
 Saggio, 23, 146 
 Salamis, 142, 272 
 Salassi, 89 
 Sallet (von), 317 
 Sallust, 110 
 Salt, 45 
 Samhaisc, 33 
 Samos, 222 
 Samoyedes, 3 
 Sapec, 24, 157 
 Sarah, 113 
 Sardes, 206 
 Sassanide kings, 151 
 
 Saxon coins, 321 
 
 Sayoe, 202 
 
 Scales of silver, 193 
 
 — used, 226 
 
 Scandinavian currency, 34 
 Scapte Hyle, 73 
 Schliemann, 129, 231 
 Sohoenus, 365 
 Schrader, 60, 69, 70, 92 
 Soillinga, 39 
 
 Scirou, 331 
 Screapall, 33 
 Scriptulum, 351 
 Seripulum, 135 
 Scrupulus, 352 
 Scythians, 67 
 
 — use gold, but not copper, 69 
 Seal, 322 
 
 SedS,cy, 44 
 Seebobm, P., 404 
 Sembella, 379 
 Semis, 369 
 Sequani, 332 
 Servius, 376 
 Sestertius, 363, 379 
 Sexagesimal system, 198 
 Sextantal as, 362 
 Sextans, 348 
 Sextula, 351, 384 
 Shakespeare, 349 
 Shayast, 150 
 Sheep, 33, 324, 370, 374 
 
 — as coin type, 272 
 
 — as unit, 272 
 
 — weights, 271 
 Shekel, 35 
 
 — as unit of Hebrew system, 273 
 
 — earlier than mina, 246 
 
 — heavy, 259 
 
 — light, heavy, 201 
 
 — of Sanctuary, 273 
 Shekels, 269 
 
 Shell money, 14 
 Shells of silver, 22 
 Shield, 331, 334 
 
 — in Homer, 331 
 Shilling, 37 
 
 Siamese bullet-money, 28 
 
 — coins, 161 
 Sicanians, 347 
 Sioels, 347 
 
 Sicilian gold unit, 131 
 
 — silver coinage, 359 
 
 — system, 346 
 
 — talent, 131, 137, 304, 359 
 Sioilicus, 368 
 
 SicUy, 31 
 
 Siculo-Punic coins, 289 
 Sieyonian shield, 334 
 Sidonians, 117 
 Sierra Leone, 39 
 Siglus, 261 
 
416 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Silenus, 323 
 Siliqua, 182 
 Silphiomachos, 326 
 Silphium, 314, 325 
 
 — on coins of Gyrene, 50 
 Silver, 57 
 
 — at Eome, 139, 373 
 
 — coinage, Roman, 362 
 
 — coins, origin of Greek, 315 
 
 — discovery of, 98, 100 
 
 — found in Cilicia, 146 
 
 — furnaces for, 98 
 
 — in Cilicia, 286 
 
 — in Gaul, 93 
 
 — in Greece, 310 
 
 — in Palestine, 147 
 
 — not weighed in Homer, 117 
 
 — relation to bronze, 380 
 
 — scarce in Egypt, 146 
 
 — standard, 260 
 
 — standards, table, 209 
 variation of, 337 
 
 — value of, 146 
 Silverlings, 269 
 Silvestre, 157 
 Sipylus, 71 
 
 Six, M., 321 
 
 Sjogren, 70 
 
 Slave-boy, 326 
 
 Slave, foreign, more valuable, 55 
 
 — Hebrew, value of, 148 
 
 — in Homer, 30 
 Slaves, 11, 323 
 
 — constancy of price, 54 
 
 — in Congo, 42 
 
 — in Darfour, 46 
 
 — in Wales, 32 
 
 — male, female, 54 
 Soanes, 70 
 Solidus, 33, 181, 384 
 Solomon, 147 
 
 Solon's coinage, 306, 824 
 
 — standard, 306 
 Sophocles, 204 
 Sophron, 364 
 Sophytes, 127 
 Soteria, 327 
 Soudan, 312 
 
 Soul, weighing of, 150 
 
 Soumyt, 46 
 
 Soutzo, M., 134, 203, 347, 368, 380 
 
 — view of relation between the 
 metals, 136 
 
 Spain, mines of, 96, 97 
 Spata, 84 
 Spear-brooch, 36 
 Spices weighed, 276 
 Spirals, 36 
 
 — Keltic, 38 
 
 — Scandinavian, 37 
 Squirrel akin as unit, 4 
 Stater, use of, 308 
 
 Sterlings, 225 
 Stiver, 186 
 Stockfish, 18, 316 
 Strabo, 71, 97 
 String of cash, 24 
 Sumatra, 172 
 Sun's diameter, 203 
 Suvarna, 127, 178 
 Svoronos, 314 
 Swine, 378 
 
 — with Gauls, 333 
 Symbol as mark of worth, 324 
 Syracusan standard, 362 
 Syracuse, coinage of, 225 
 Szins, 25 
 
 Taberdier, 158 
 Tacoe, 186 
 Tael, 158 
 Taku, 186 
 Talanton, 228, 304 
 Talent, 244 
 
 — Homeric, 2 aeqq. 
 
 — Macedonian, 125, 304 
 
 — origin of, 262 
 
 — Sicilian, 304 
 Tantalus, 71 
 Tapaks, 167 
 Taras, 364 
 Tarbelli, 92 
 Tarentum, 364 
 Tarneih, 44 
 Tarshish, 97 
 Tartessus, 96, 97 
 Taurisei, 87, 339 
 Tax, hut, 25 
 Tea as money, 23 
 Teanum, 369 
 Tectosages, 90 
 Temples as banks, 215 
 Tenedos, 318 
 
 Teos, 210, 340 
 Tcstudo, 329 
 Tetl, 192 
 Tetras, 348 
 Teutonic peoples, 34 
 Thasos, 220, 323, 344 
 
 — mines of, 73 
 Thebes, 334 
 Theocritus, 137 
 Theseus, 331 
 Thomas, 176 
 Thothmes HI., 128 
 Thracian coinage, 342 
 Thracians, 340 
 Thucydides, 72, 211 
 Thumb, 353 
 Thurii, 322 
 Tibetan currency, 23 
 Tical, 29 
 Timaeus, 51, 379 
 
 Time, measurement of, 198 
 
INDEX. 
 
 417 
 
 Timoleon, 225, 289 
 Tin, 97, 173 
 
 — Cornish, 83 
 
 — discovery of, in Sumatra, 100 
 
 — coins, 225 
 
 — rings of, 44 
 Tiryns, 84, 231 
 Tjams, 24 
 Tmolus, 70 
 Tobacco, 45 
 Tola, 177 
 Tolosa, 90 
 Tomme, 353 
 Torres Straits, 105 
 Tortoise, 313, 333 
 
 — Island, 331 
 
 — (sea), 215 
 •— shell, 328 
 
 currency, 21 
 
 masks, 105 
 
 Tortoises of terra cotta, 329 
 
 — of wood, 330 
 
 and earthenware, 330 
 
 Toukkiyeh, 44 
 
 Trade routes, 105 
 
 Tremisais, 385 
 
 Trias, 348 
 
 Triohalcum, 346 
 
 Triens, 348 
 
 Tripods, 314 
 
 Troy grain, origin of, 181 ; of ounce, 
 
 386 
 Tsohudi, 70 
 Tunny coins of Olbia, 317 
 
 — fish, 315 
 
 Cyzicus, 50 
 
 Olbia, 50 
 
 Turdetani, 97 
 Turkey rhubarb, 83 
 Turti, 97 
 
 Types parlants, 322 
 Tyre, 200 
 
 — fall of, 141 
 Tylor, 229 
 
 Umbrians, 64 
 
 Uncia, derivation of, 353 
 
 — Boman, 359 
 Unga, 33 
 Unguis, 354 
 Ur, 197 
 Ural-Altaic range, 204 
 
 — region, 68 
 Uten, 203, 238 
 
 Varro, 375, 378 
 Venusia, 369 
 Victoriatus, 377 
 Victumulae, mines of, 88 
 
 Vines, distance apart, dbb 
 
 K. 
 
 Vomis, 354 
 Vulci, 354 
 
 Wadai, 44 
 
 Wade, Sir T., 158 
 
 Wai wai, 105 
 
 Wales, 31 
 
 Wall paintings, 128 
 
 Walrus hide, 47 
 
 Wampum, 14 
 
 Weapons, 35 
 
 Weighing of the soul, 150 
 
 Weight, its origin, 12 
 
 — of potatoes, 358 
 
 — unit, how fixed, 168 
 Weights, false, 241 
 
 — in connection with currency, 
 
 271 
 
 — in form of animals, 153, 401 
 oxen, 128 
 
 — in shape of cows, 243 
 Weissenborn, 212 
 Welsh currency, 32 
 West, E. W., 148 
 Whale's teeth, 21 
 Wheat, 122 
 
 — corn, 179 
 
 — corn in Assyria, 163 
 
 — corns, 180 
 
 — ear, 827 
 
 — grain, 182 
 Wheaten straw, 109 
 Wicklow, gold in, 334 
 Wife, payment for, 44 
 
 — price of, 44, 105 
 Wilamowitz, 306 
 Wine, 328 
 
 — cup, 328 
 
 — jar, 323 
 
 — trade, of Carthage, of Gauls, 326 
 Wolf, 335 
 
 Wood as currency, 42 
 Woodpeckers' scalps, 15 
 Wool merchants, 117 
 
 — weighed in Homer, 118 
 
 — weighing of, 116 
 
 Xenophanes, 205, 293 
 Xenophon, 887 
 
 — De Vectigalibus, 338 
 
 Yard, English imperial, 266 
 
 — of butter, 358 
 
 — of land, 358 
 
 Zancle, 348 
 Zeohariah, 148 
 Zend Avesta, 149 
 
 physicians' fees, 26 
 
 Zulus, 2, 42 
 
 27 
 
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