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All that Is Solid's avatar

Thank you for this wonderful essay. I am left with the conclusion that the Romans were far clevere than we are in that they correctly identified the evils of usury.

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LudwigF's avatar

Thank you very much for this most interesting and informative article.

I think you are correct in suggesting that, lacking a better or safer option, a wealthy Roman would secure his liquid assets by burying them in a hole in his garden. When from time to time we uncover hoards of buried Roman coinage, the silver denarii are invariably well circulated, while the gold aureii tend to be pretty much ‘as new’, indicating that they were a store of value rather than a medium of exchange.

Extending slightly the thought, I wonder to what extent the Romans understood the functioning of their economy. Whether for example they had a grasp of the concept of supply and demand and how it impacted price levels, or how and why the depreciating the currency by reducing the precious metal content of the coinage, led to inflation, or realised that ‘bad coinage drives out good’ (Gresham’s Law).

Thank you again for your writings.

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