![]() ![]() in Asia Minor, where the elites of Lydia and Ionia used stamped silver and gold coins to pay armies. ![]() The earliest known mints date to 650 and 600 B.C. The Mesopotamian shekel – the first known form of currency – emerged nearly 5,000 years ago. People even used live animals such as cows until relatively recent times as a form of currency. Native copper, meteorites or native iron, obsidian, amber, beads, copper, gold, silver and lead ingots have variously served as currency. These included shells such as mother-of-pearl that were widely circulated in the Americas and cowry shells that were used in Africa, Europe, Asia and Australia. Objects that occurred rarely in nature and whose circulation could be efficiently controlled emerged as units of value for interactions and exchange. It’s hard to accurately date interactions involving currency of various kinds, but evidence suggests they emerged from gift exchanges and debt repayments. There are many theories about the origin of money, in part because money has many functions: It facilitates exchange as a measure of value it brings diverse societies together by enabling gift-giving and reciprocity it perpetuates social hierarchies and finally, it is a medium of state power. But whatever the format, human beings have long used currency as a means of exchange, a method of payment, a standard of value, a store of wealth and a unit of account.Īs an anthropologist who’s made discoveries of ancient currency in the field, I’m interested in how money evolved in human civilization – and what these archaeological finds can tell us about trade and interaction between far-flung groups. Its form has evolved over the millennia – from natural objects to coins to paper to digital versions. First, people bartered, making direct deals between two parties of desirable objects. ![]() Scientists have tracked exchange and trade through the archaeological record, starting in Upper Paleolithic when groups of hunters traded for the best flint weapons and other tools. Assuredly it hasn’t, but the history of human beings using cash currency does go back a long time – 40,000 years. Sometimes you run across a grimy, tattered dollar bill that seems like it’s been around since the beginning of time. ![]()
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