Ancient Rome, a political power born in the 9th century BC in Europe, today's Italian capital Rome is the cultural heritage of the ancient Roman period, after the birth of this ancient Roman city-state regime, it slowly developed for a period of time and began to expand externally, and then broke away from the city-state regime and transformed into a country, with a land area of more than 5 million square kilometers at its peak.
The complete Roman period is divided into three stages, namely the stage of monarchy from 753 BC to 509 BC, the republican stage from 509 BC to 27 BC, and finally the imperial stage from 27 BC to 476 BC! The Orris gold coin of ancient Rome to be explored today was born in the republic stage!
[Breeze] The period of physical currency in ancient Rome
During the earliest city-state development period in ancient Rome, there was still the development of the culture of the ancient Greek region in this part of Europe, and the physical currency of ancient Greece was livestock, bronze, three-legged ding and other items as equivalent exchange.
In contrast, ancient Rome had only one physical currency - salt, around 640 BC, the fourth generation of the ancient Roman monarchy stage of Thecus, after he ascended to the throne, he expanded outwards and occupied Ostia, so the salt industry developed through the coast of Ostia, so it was formed to use "salt" as a circulating currency.
Why can "salt" be used as physical currency? First, because salt is easy to divide, for example, a bowl of salt can buy an apple, but it is not realistic for an animal to buy an apple, and if it is divided, it is also difficult, because buying livestock is not to satisfy the appetite; Second, salt is a necessity like livestock, which is recognized and demanded by everyone, and can meet the needs of the public, so as to ensure that the transaction can be realized immediately in the barter;
The limitations of physical money allowed real money to begin to be born
The so-called defect of physical money refers to the limitations of physical money, such as salt can allow ordinary people to exchange daily necessities, but the bulk transaction between merchants and merchants is limited, because commodity trading requires a large amount of salt to exchange, so carrying salt requires high transportation costs, so a real currency is needed to be born.
Probably between 578 and 543 BC, when the sixth monarch of the ancient Roman monarchy, Celvis Tullius, reigned, and according to the development trend of market goods, he began to mint and issue the first currency in the history of ancient Rome - As, which belonged to bronze, and As is both a monetary unit and a weight unit, 1 As is about 320 grams, so As is actually a piece of copper ingot, and a piece of copper ingot weighs 5 As.
The inscription of a ram or bull on the surface of the asbed is to declare to the public that asas belongs to the legal tender issued by the government, because there has been a use of copper ingots among the ancient Roman people, but the previous copper ingots did not have any patterns!
But at this time, the astross were still in the rough stage, until 289 BC, ancient Rome began to set up a special manufacturing and issuing of currency officials, while the ass was restructured into each only about 325 grams of 1 ass copper coins, in the front of the copper coin inscribed with a god, the back of the inscription of the bow, this currency marks the ancient Roman currency into the real development track, but also expressed that ancient Rome wants to expand at sea!
[Breeze] The silver coins of ancient Rome began to be born
The years from 225 BC to 212 BC were a critical moment in the expansion of the Roman Republic, when the ancient Romans launched the First Punic War, and through military expansion, the Ancient Roman Republic acquired a large number of silver mines, which put on the agenda the work of trying to make silver coins because of the lack of silver mines.
Therefore, in the ancient Roman Republic minted and issued the first silver coin, known as the dinar, after some issuance and circulation, the ancient Roman people began to gradually eliminate the ass copper coin, because the copper coin is relatively too bulky, and the silver coin is very easy to carry, a dinar weighs about 6.37 grams, thus making the dinar silver coin the main circulating currency of ancient Rome.
[Breeze] The reason for the birth of the Oris Gold Coin
First, military spending while using gold coins. In the later period of the ancient Roman Republic, it basically maintained the rhythm of external expansion, so it needed to raise a large number of troops to ensure the victory of its external expansion, so it needed to spend a lot of money;
But many times, especially in the stage of war, the use of silver coins to issue military expenses is not enough, so the use of gold coins to replace, when the gold coins to the hands of soldiers, will definitely be taken to spend, after all, the ancient Roman official did not prohibit the circulation of gold coins, slowly gold coins began to appear in the market circulation.
Secondly, for commemoration. Through the issuance of copper coins and silver coins in the front, we can see a feature, that is, the rulers of ancient Rome liked to use coins to express many of their meanings, including cultural transmission, declaration of political purposes, etc., and also liked to use coins as souvenirs;
For example, every time the war triumphs, in addition to holding celebrations, commemorative gold coins will be made for nobles and soldiers, as well as those who have contributed to the country, and these commemorative coins are different from now, they can be circulated and used at that time, but ordinary people will not use them for honor, but there are always people who will choose to use commemorative coins as coins, so there is gold coins circulating on the market.
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