Coins – the first form of money

will paper or plastic notes, and money will at last have achieved the pure status of a mathematical formulation, a system of electronic credits and debits. B. In the modern media environment, the sheer number of visual images is overwhelming, but it makes one stop to think that coins are among the most durable of our artefacts, and future archaeologists will scrutinise coins in order to learn about their distant ancestors. This is exactly the way ancient coins have informed us for over four millennia. There are thousands of different coins, each designed to carry meaning as well as value, tiny but rich sources of documentary evidence about events and cultural attitudes, frequently produced with exquisite craftsmanship. C. Coins in Europe date from 2,500 to 2,700 years ago, and seem to have originated in the ancient kingdom of Lydia, in what is now Turkey. Before coins, trade was based on barter: the direct trade of commodities. Barter required the physical presence of both commodities that were being traded. Metal coins were far more portable, and not subject to the same spoilage on long sea journeys as a commodity like grain might be if it became wet. However, they could also be accumulated, and these hoards could be…