CHAPTER I.

ON THE ORIGIN AND PROGRESS OF NUMISMATICS.

The origin of coins must be sought from the time when, following the dispersal of the nations, various languages arose. Since the exchange of goods, the simplest and most ancient method of commerce, no longer seemed sufficiently convenient as the multitude of men grew, nothing seemed more suitable for commerce than metals, especially those that appeared perpetual due to their natural qualities.

It seems that the beginning was made with silver, which was weighed out in masses or rough particles, as gold-bearing lands were not yet known. Later, these rough masses of silver and bronze were marked with certain signs indicating weight and value. Finally, a specific weight was established for individual pieces, and a type was impressed upon them. Consult the pamphlet by Herman Ulr. à Lingen On the origin and inventors of money and coins, Jena, 1715, quarto.

->§ III.

The argument concerning the first inventor of coins is as uncertain and controversial as that which concerns the first inventor of letters. Yet it is highly probable that the coins which were massae rudes rough masses were first in use in Chaldea, the land first inhabited after the flood, and from there were carried to Babylon, Egypt, Greece, and finally to the Romans and other peoples. See Genesis, Chapters 20:16, 23:15-16, and 33:19. Compare Ott. Sperlingius Dissertation on the coins of the ancients and moderns not struck with a die, Amsterdam, 1700, quarto, Chapters II and III.