Burns A.R. Money and Monetary Policy in Early Times

Routledge, 2013. — 565 p.In a conclusion which sums up the lines of argument of his valuable study of money as an element in the growth of early civilisation, Mr. Burns enumerates the deficiencies in the evidence, for, as he says, it is as well to keep in mind the things we do not know, as well as those we do. This is wise, for the gaps in our evidence are great and the theories of numismatists and archæologists have not always been marked by restraint. For example, throughout the whole period with which the author deals, there is no evidence of the legal weight of coins, nor is it known what were the practical conditions of monetary law and the circulation of currency. How did the State decide what was the quantity of coins to be circulated? This is a point of peculiar importance for Mr. Burns's study, of which the originality lies particularly in his investigation of the use of monetary issues in relation to political supremacy. As a result he shows how, broadly, a distinction can be drawn between the policy of the great eastern empires and that of the Greek States. This is a not-very-well organized summary of the early history of money and associated policies, though it is not apparent to me just how one would better organize the subject material. The text is full of interesting factual material despite the rather random fashion in which it is presented. It is not bedtime-reading, but is a project for one who is determined to learn something about the root of all commerce. I would have liked to see a chapter devoted to a systematic history of counterfeiting, coin clipping, debasing of noble metal content, etc.