I. UNCOINED MONEY.—I. Uneoined Money in the many excavations which have been made in Egypt, Assyria, and Babylonia, no specimen of coined money has yet been discovered. Egyptian money was composed of rings of gold and silver ; and in Assyria and Babylonia only clay tablets commemorating grants of money specified by weight have been found in considerable numbers ; whilst in Phoenicia no pieces of an anti quity earlier than the Persian rule have yet come to light (Rawlinson, Herod., vol. i. p. Nor, indeed, is coined money found in the time of Homer, but traffic was pursued either by simple barter vii. 472 ; xxiii. 702 ; Odyss. i• ; or by means of masses of unwrought metal, like lumps of iron (II. xxiii. 826 ; Odyss. i. 184) ; or by quantities of gold and silver, espe cially of gold (//. ix. 122, 279 ; xix. 247 ; 269 ; • Odyss. iv. 129 ; viii. 393; ix. 202, etc.), which latter metal, called by Homer rcENavTov Voce), seems to be the only one measured by weight. Before the introduction of coined money into Greece by Pheidon, king of Argos, there was a currency of clpeXicrpx, or 'skewers,' six of which were considered a handful (Sprexp4). Colonel Leake thinks that they were small pyra midal pieces of silver (Num. Chron., vol. xvii. p. 203 ; Num. Hellen., p. z, appendix), but it seems more probable that they were nails of iron or copper, capable of being used as spits in the Homeric fashion. This is likely, from the fact that six of them made a handful, and that they were therefore of a considerable size (Rawlinson, Herod., App., bk. i. p. 688).
2. Eh:cowed Money in the O. T.—The first notice in the Bible, after the Flood, of uncoined money as a representative of property and medium of exchange, is when Abraham came up out of Egypt very rich in cattle, in silver, and in gold' (Gen. xiii. 2; xxiv. 35). We next find money' used in commerce. In the purchase of the cave of Machpelah, it is said, And Abraham 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 merchant' "ITO ; LXX. Sorcip.ov 4/.zor6poes, Gen. xxiii. z6). When Jericho was taken, Achan embezzled from the spoils zoo shekels of silver, and a wedge (Heb. tongue) of gold (-0.63 xpveri)v) of 5o shekels weight (Josh. vii. 21). Silver as a medium of com merce may be met with among the nations of the Philistines (Gen. xx. 16 ; Judg. xvi. 5, 18 ; xvii. 2, seq.), the Midianites (Gen. xxxvii. 28), and the Syrians (2 Kings v. 5, 23). By the laws of Moses, men and cattle (Lev. xxvii. 3, seq. ; Num. iii. 45, seq.), the possessing houses and fields (Lev, xxvii. 14, seg.), provisions (Dent. ii. 6, zS ; xiv. 26), and all fines for offences (Exod. xxi. xxii.) were deter. mined by the value of money. The contributions to the temple (Exod. xxx. 13 ; xxxviii. 26), the sacri fice of animals (Lev. v. is), the redemption of the first-born (Num. iii. 45, seq. ; xviii. 15, seq.), the
payment to the seer (i Sam. ix. 7, seq.)—in all these cases the value is always represented as silver. It seems probable from many passages in the Bible that a system of jewel currency or ring money was also adopted as a medium of exchange. The case of Rebekah, to whom the servant of Abraham gave a golden earring of half a shekel weight, and two bracelets for her hands of ten shekels weight of gold' (Gen. xxiv. 22), proves that the ancients made their jewels of a specific weight, so as to know the value of the ornaments in employing them as money. That the Egyptians kept their bullion in jewels seems evident from the plate given by Sir Gardner Wilkinson, copied from the catacombs, where they are represented weigh ing rings of silver and gold ; and is further corro borated by the fact of the Israelites having, at their exodus from Egypt, borrowed jewels of silver and jewels of gold,' and spoiled the Egyptians' (Exod. xii. 35, 36). According to the ancient drawings, the Egyptian ring-money was composed of perfect rings. So, too, it would appear that the money used by the children of Jacob, when they went to purchase corn in Egypt, was also an annular cur rency (Gen. xlii. 35). Their money is described as bundles of money' (LXX. a/cri.zot), and when returned to them, was found to be of [full] weight' (Gen. xliii. 21). The account of the sale of Joseph by his brethren affords another instance of the employment of jewel ornaments as a medium of exchange (Gen. xxxvii. 28) ; and that the Midianites carried the whole of their bullion wealth in the form of rings and jewels seems more than probable from the account in Numbers of the spoiling of the Midianites—' We have therefore brought an oblation for the Lord what every man hath gotten (Heb. found), of jewels of gold, chains, and bracelets, rings, eanings, and tablets, to make an atonement for our souls before the Lord. And Moses and Eleazar the priest took the gold of them, even all wrought jewels' (xxxi. 5o, 51). The friends of Job, when visiting him at the end of the time of his trial, each gave him a piece of money (ntripo and an earring of gold LXX. Terpc(5paxna, xpuctor Kat do-it Am}, thus suggesting the employment of a ring currency. (For this question, see W. B. Dickinson in the .rVirm. Chron., vols. vi. to xvi., passim.) The Kesitah, which has been rendered by the interpreters as a lamb,' and supposed to be a coin impressed with the figure of a lamb, is evidently a piece of silver of unknown weight (Hussey, Weights and Measures, p. 194). Sup posing that the above-quoted passages relative to a gold medium of exchange be not admitted, there is a passage recording a purchase made in gold in the time of David. The threshing-floor of Oman was bought by David for 600 shekels of gold by weight II Chron. xxi. 25). Yet even this is ren dered doubtful by the parallel passage mentioning the price paid as 5o shekels of silver (2 Sam. xxiv. 24).