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THE HISTORY OF CURRENCY
1252 TO 1896
BY W.A. SHAW
[1896]
Reprints of Economic Classics
Augustus M. Kelley Publishers
NEW YORK 1967
First Edition 1895
(London: Wilsons & Milne, 29 Paternoster Row, 1895)
Reprinted 1967 by
AUGUSTUS M. KELLEY PUBLISHERS
From Second Edition of 1896
Library of Congress Catalogue Card Number 67-20086
Printed in the United States of America
by Sentry Press, New York, N.Y. 10019
THE HISTORY OF CURRENCY
1252 TO 1894
Being an Account of the Gold and Silver Moneys and Monetary
Standards of Europe and America, together with an Examination of
the effects of Currency and Exchange Phenomena on Commercial and
National Progress and Well-being
BY W.A. SHAW, M.A.
LATE BERKELEY FELLOW OF THE OWENS COLLEGE
FELLOW OF THE ROYAL HISTORICAL AND ROYAL STATISTICAL SOCIETIES
Second Edition
New York: G.P. PUTNAM'S SONS
London: WILSONS & MILNE
1896
TO
RICHARD COPLEY CHRISTIE
THIS BOOK IS RESPECTFULLY DEDICATED
IN MEMORY OF A FRIENDSHIP
OF PECULIAR GRACE AND INSPIRATION
PREFACE
The purpose of this book is twofold--first and foremost, to illustrate a
question of principle by the aid of historic test and application;
secondly, to furnish for the use of historical students an elementary
handbook of the currencies of the more important European states from
the thirteenth century downwards.
Little need be said as to this latter purpose. The total omission of the
historic, reasoned, and consecutive study of currency history--the most
important domain of practical economics--from the curriculum of every
university in the land is matter for surprise and regret, and can only
be attributed to the lack of an initiative and of a handbook.
As to the former purpose, there is no field of history so strewn with
scientific (i.e. comparative and prophetic) possibilities as economic
history; and in economic history there is no department in which the
study of the experience of other times and nations is more necessary and
resultful, lesson-full, wisdom-full, than the domain of currency. The
verdict of history on the great problem of the nineteenth
century--bimetallism--is clear and crushing and final, and against the
evidence of history no gainsaying of theory ought for a moment to stand.
Throughout mediaeval Europe and up to the close of the eighteenth century
the currency of Europe was practically bimetallic--practically, because
actually so without the prescription of a law of tender, and without the
allowance of any theoretic grasp or conception of the practice as
distinctively what nowadays we understand as bimetallic.
The conception of a law of tender is quite modern. And the evolution of
the idea of such a law has gone hand in hand with the evolution of a
conception of monetary theory on the part of the legislator--that is,
with the bitter experience which for want of such a conception Europe
endured for centuries. In all systems of jurisprudence money and minting
appertains to the kingly office, and the development of the law of
tender is to be traced in royal proclamations of the King in Council for
long before it became the subject of parliamentary legislation. For
centuries, such proclamations were issued, referring to a prohibition of
export of the precious metals, banishing foreign coins from the land,
or, again, permitting their circulation, and, in that case, prescribing
the rough tariff or rate according to which (foreign) coin for (native)
coin they should be current. In such proclamations there is no idea of
separating the two metals, gold and silver; there is no idea of a law
of tender; there is no intention to declare a ratio; there is no
conception of _bullion_ apart from coin. The two metals had grown to be
the circulating and exchange medium; they were actually there, and all
that had to be done was to keep them there. The advantage which was to
be derived from a trade in bullion, and from an understanding of the
effects of differently-prevailing ratios in different countries, was
known only to the Jew and the Italian. They plied their trade in secret,
and the legislator was only apprised of the result by suddenly finding a
slipping away and dearth of coinage. Then the legislator altered the
tariff, and gradually rose to the conception of the ratio as underlying
this process of seduction. Then, as a further defence of a particular
class of coins, he imposed a limitation on the tender of such, so as to
prevent bullion operations on it. This limitation was the first
development of a law of tender. Throughout, from the thirteenth to the
eighteenth century, both gold and silver had been actually employed in
European commerce without any idea either of declaring or of restricting
the tender, whether of the one or the other.
The final outcome of the application of the law of tender was the
development of the modern monometallic system--a system in which alone
lay the safeguard against the operation of the bullionist. It was only
at the close of the eighteenth century that England evolved this system
and flung away the last remains of that mediaeval ignorance which had
brought with it such a dower of mishap. France has taken almost a
century of further experience before arriving at the same point of
development.
Another point. At the time that England was shaking off the mediaeval
system France, too, was accomplishing a reform of her money system. It
stopped half-way. The old kingly prerogative of altering the coinage was
taken away, the unit of the currency was declared definite and
unchangeable, and the seigniorage on minting was abolished. So much was
accomplished by her law of 1803. But no further application was made of
the law of tender than to throw the sanction of legal enactment over
that mediaeval system which had been the bane of France since first two
metals found circulation in her bounds. As far as tender is concerned,
there is no difference between the practice of the French monetary
system in 1726 and that of 1803. The system was bimetallic in both
cases--in the first case, legally by recognition and as resting on the
royal jurisdiction; in the second case, legally by direct legislative or
parliamentary enactment. The idea that the law of 1803 created a new
system and a new heaven for France is doubly absurd. It was a
continuation of a very old and a very danger-fraught system, with its
roots deep in mediaeval ignorance and practice.
In addition to this--and quite as demonstrably--there was no conception
of a theory of bimetallism in 1803, nor any conception of a bimetallic
function to be performed for the good of the human race by bimetallic
France. This is a conception of the schools, and bred of later needs and
hopes and fears. The modern theory of bimetallism is almost the only
instance in history of a theory growing not out of practice, but of the
failure of practice; resting not on data verified, but on data falsified
and censure-marked. No words can be too strong of condemnation for the
theorising of the bimetallist who, by sheer imaginings, tries to justify
theoretically what has failed in five centuries of history, and to
expound theoretically what has proved itself incapable of solution save
by cutting and casting away.
Such a verdict as this of history, negative as it is, must strike many a
serious mind with dismay. The following of bimetallism would not be what
it is were it not for the despair of any other remedy for the situation
at the moment. We are thereby left apparently hopeless and remediless.
But the first step to the discovery of a true and possible remedy, if
any exists, can only be the casting away of the false and impossible.
The difference between the monetary problem of the seventeenth century
and that of to-day lies in this, that while there has been continuity of
history and development there has been a change of needs and
circumstance. The danger of arbitrage transactions to the mediaeval
legislator lay in the fact that they stripped the country, which
suffered from them, not, or not merely, of a bullion reserve, but of
her actual currency, and rendered even internal trade impossible. He
accordingly tried to arrest the drain by threatening imprisonment and
death.
To-day the safety and supply of the internal currency of the various
states is provided for by a monometallic system or by note issue, while,
conversely, trade in the precious metals has become free, and bullion
flows automatically from land to land in accordance with the dictates of
a now rightly-conceived theory of international trade. Just so far the
monetary problem has changed--becoming a question of the evolution of a
stable international exchange system. The theoretic pretensions of
bimetallism have correspondingly widened, but on any ground, wide or
narrow, the only material for the study, comprehension, and judgment of
such pretensions lies in the actual experience of Europe during the past
five centuries.
A few words of more particular explanation are necessary.
1. To the student of money and monetary standards the perpetually
recurring phenomena of reductions of the unit and standard weights and
contents of coins will present no difficulty. Three causes underlay the
process--(1) the practice of alloying, (2) the competitive and dishonest
action of governments, (3) the ideal nature of the unit itself, which
permitted, literally, anything in the way of arbitrary manipulation
(compare, e.g., the very different depreciations of the English
shilling and the French sou, being both descendants of the solidus; or
again, of the French livre and the Italian lire, being both descendants
of the libra).
2. A second and much greater difficulty is presented by the confusion of
nomenclature. It is often difficult to determine what particular piece
is meant by a given name, or, if the identity of the piece can be fixed,
its period may still be uncertain. In French numismatic history, for
instance, the term florin d'or or denier d'or is used in documents quite
generically for the more specific florins d'or a l'agnel, a l'ecu, aux
fleurs de lis, a la masse, moutons d'or, etc. This quite indeterminate
use of the word "florin" (= denier = "piece," or generally, "coin") may
possibly explain the crux to be found on pages 3, 9, 301, and 399 of the
text (infra.), where florins d'or are mentioned in French history more
than seventy years before the first authentic minting of the gold florin
at Florence.
3. With regard to the figures of the ratios there is great difference
and divergence among the various authorities. The declared ratio may be
of a double nature--(1) mercantile, as calculated on the purchase price
of gold and silver in the open market; (2) legal, as settled by law in
the terms prescribed for Mint purchase and issue. The former is
comparatively simple, but it is not until a quite recent date, the
opening of the eighteenth century, that it is statistically
determinable. The table of the commercial ratio (pp. 157-9 infra.) is
taken from Soetbeer, and was by him calculated on the Hamburg exchange
and London market rates. The competing figures of the commercial ratio
drawn up by Ingham in his Report to the Senate of the United States (4th
May 1830), and by John White, of the same date (see _United States
Report of the International Monetary Conference of 1878_, pp. 583, 647),
I regard as comparatively untrustworthy.
With regard to the legal or Mint ratio (see infra., tables, pp. 40,
69-70, 157) there is the greatest discrepancy, and I print the figures
with much trepidation and every mental reserve. The differences in the
results arrived at by the various authorities are due to the difference
in method of calculation, according as the issue price or the purchase
price at the Mint is taken (i.e. with or without allowance of
seigniorage and remedy), or according as the pure or gross content of
the piece is calculated from (i.e. with or without allowance for alloy).
As a matter of fact, hardly any two authorities or sets of calculations
agree. See, for instance, duplicate sets of figures for Holland in
Appendix 1. to Schimmel's _Geschiedkundig overzicht_; or again, compare
Soetbeer's figures with those deduced by Koehler in his _Grundliche
Nachricht_; or by Dr. Arnold Luschin, in the _Proceedings of the Congres
International de Numismatique_, 1880, p. 443; or with those deducible
from Le Blanc's tables (infra., Appendix VI.). It is to this difference
that must be attributed the discrepancy in the statement of the ratio
by the French Mint authorities in 1640 (see text, infra., p. 92 and
note, ibid.). The difficulty of calculating the European Mint ratio at
any moment can be judged from the experience and statements of persons
so widely apart as Sir Isaac Newton in England, Mirabeau and Calonne in
France, and Morris and Hamilton in the United States (see infra., pp.
172-3, 229-30, and 251).
With regard to the scope of the present work, it is confined entirely to
the history of metallic currency and standard. There is no reference to
the paper-money experience of any country, not even America or Austria.
Such a subject must form matter for a separate treatment. The account of
Austrian money is, therefore, to be found in Appendix v., under Germany,
and on the effects of the latest Austrian reform (as also of the latest
development in India and the United States) no opinion whatever is
expressed. I content myself with the simple statement of fact and event.
In appending a list of the authorities used, it is difficult to overcome
the feeling of humiliation which has come to me from the contrast of the
ephemeral, slight, and unworthy treatment of monetary history to-day,
with the grand, solid, scholarly works which the eighteenth century
produced. With the exception of Soetbeer's magnificent labours, without
which the present work would have been simply impossible as far as the
statements of production and relativity of the precious metals are
concerned, and of the similar historic work of M. Ottomar Haupt, the
literature of this subject to-day is light and polemic and transitory to
a nauseating degree.
GENERAL
_Authorities._
J.D. Koehler Grundliche Nachricht von dem Muenzwesen
insgemein. Helmstadt, 1739 and 1741.
Third edition (Leipzig, 1781),
enlarged and attributed to Von Praun.
Budelius De monetis et re numaria (with twenty-four
other treatises). Coloniae Agrippinae,
1591.
Melchior Goldast Catholicon rei monetariae sive leges
monarchichae generales de rebus
numariis, etc. Frankfort, 1620.
Almanach des Monnaies. Paris, 1784.
Muenze und Muenzwissenschaft (Oec. Techn. Encyc. xcvii.).
Nicole Oresme Traite de la premiere invention des monnaies,
and--
Copernicus Traite de la monnaie, both re-edited by
Wolowski. Paris, 1864.
Jean Bodin Descours sur le rehaussement et diminution
tant d'or que d'argent et le moyen d'y
remedier [en reponse] aux paradoxes du
sieur de Malestroict (appended to
Bodin's Six Livres de la Republique.
Lyons, 1593).
H.C. Dittmer Geschichte der ersten Gold-Ausmuenzungen zu
Luebeck im 14 Jahrhundert (Zeitschrift
der Vereins fuer Luebeckische
Geschichte), Heft. i. 885.
J.G. Hall On European Mediaeval Gold Coins (Numismatic
Chronicle). Third Series, vol. ii. pp.
212-226.
P. Joseph Historisch-kritische Beschreibung des
Bretzheimer Goldguldenfundes vergraben
um 1390, nebst einem verzeichniss der
bisher bekannten Goldgulden vom
Florentiner Gepraege. Mainz, 1883.
K.T. Eheberg Ueber das aeltere deutsche Muenzwesen und die
Hausgenossenschaften. Leipzig, 1879.
Neueste Muenzkunde Leipzig, 1853.
A.H. Smith Encyclopaedia of Gold and Silver Coins of the
World. Philadelphia, 1886.
A. Soetbeer Edelmetall--Produktion und Werthverhaeltniss
zwischen Gold und Silber, seit der
Entdeckung Amerika's bis zur
Gegenwart. Gotha, 1879.
" Materialien zur Erklaerung und Beurtheilung
der wirthschaftlichen
Edelmetallverhaltnisse und der
waehrungsfrage. Berlin.
A. Soetbeer Litteraturnachweis ueber Geld--und Muenzwesen.
Berlin, 1892.
F. Altes Traite comparatif des monnaies, poids et
mesures. 1832.
G.K. Chelins Mass and Gewichtsbuch. 1830.
Gerhardt Tafeln, etc. Berlin, 1818.
Doederlein Commentatio Historica de Nummis. 1729.
C.C. Schmiede Handworterbuch der Muenzkunde. 1811.
J. Leitzmann Abriss einer Geschichte der gesammten
Muenzkunde ... aller voelker Fursten und
Staedte der aeltern, Mittlern, und
neuern Zeit. Erfurt, 1828.
GERMANY
_Authorities._
J.P. Ludewig Einleitung zu dem teutschen muentwesen mittler
Zeiten, etc. 1709.
J.F. Klotzsch Versuch einer Chur Saechischen Muenzgeschichte.
1779.
D.E. Beyschlag Versuch einer Muenzgeschichte Augsburgs in dem
Mittelalter. 1835.
C. Binder Wuerttembergische Muenz und Medaillenkunde.
1848.
C.P.C. Schoenemann Zur vaterlaendischen Muenzkunde vom 12-15
Jahrhundert. 1852.
J.D. Koehler Historische Muenz Belustigungen, 22 vols.
1729-65.
H. Pauli Tableaux des monnaies de l'Allemagne, etc.
Frankfort, 1846.
J.G. Hirsch Das teutschen Reichs Muenz Archiv, etc., 9 vols.
folio. 1750-68 (absolutely unequalled
and indispensable).
J. Leitzmann Wegweiser auf dem Gebiete den deutschen
Muenzkunde. Weissensen, 1869.
Euler Verzeichniss und Beschreibung der frankfurter
Goldmuenzen mit einer geschichtlichen
Einleitung etc. (Archiv fur Frankfurts
Geschichte und Kunst), Heft iv. 1847.
E.L. Jaeger Das Geld nebst einer kurzem Geschichte des
deutschen Geldes. Stuttgart, 1877.
Geschichtliche Darstellung des alten und neuen
teutschen Muenzwesens. Weimar, 1817.
J.F. Hauschild Zur Geschichte des deutschen mass und
Muenzwesens. Frankfort, 1861.
A. Soetbeer Denkschrift ueber Hamburgs Muenzverhaeltnisse.
Hamburg, 1846.
H.P. Cappe Die Muenzen der deutschen Kaiser und Koenige das
Mettelalters. 1850.
C.P.C. Schoenemann Zur vaterlaendischen Muenzkunde. 1852.
J.P. Graumann Gesammelte Briefe vom dem Gelde, von dem
Wechsel, etc. 1762.
J.G. Hoffmann Die Lehre von Gelde. 1838.
" Die Zeichen der Zeit. 1841.
J. Albrecht Munzgeschichte der Hauses Hohenlohe, vom 13-19
Jahrhundert.
Grote and Hoelzermann Lippische Geld und Muenzgeschichte, 1867.
(Nachtrage by Weingaertner. 1890).
E.J. Bergius Das Geld und Bank wesen in Preussen. 1846.
A. Von Berstett Munzgeschichte des zaehringen badischen
Fuerstenhauses. 1846.
D. Braun Bericht von Pohlnisch und Preussischen
Muenzwesen. 1722.
E. Bahrfeldt Das Muenzwesen der Mark Brandenburg bis zum
Anfange der Hohenzollern. 1889.
Koehne Das Muenzwesen der Stadt Berlin, 1837.
F.H. Grautoff Historische Schriften, 3 vols. 1836 (for Luebeck
Mint).
C.F. Eheberg Ueber das aeltere deutsche Muenzwesen. 1879.
J. Newald Beitrag zur Geschichte des Oesterreichischen
Muenzwesen im ersten Viertel des 18
Jahrhunderts. Vienna, 1881.
Max Wirth Geschichte der Handelskrisen. Frankfort, 1890.
" Das Geld, Geschichte der Umlaufmittel von der
altesten Zeit bis an die Gegenwart.
Leipzig, 1884.
FRANCE
_Authorities._
F. De Saulcy Recueil de Documents relatifs a l'histoire des
monnaies frappees par les rois de
France depuis Philippe II., jusqu' a
Francois I., 4 vols. 4to. Paris, 1879.
(The unique value of this work is
sadly impaired by the cutting out of
the preambles of the various
proclamations, etc.).
Le Blanc Traite historique des monnaies de France.
Paris, 1690.
Du Cange Glossarium mediae et infimae Latinitatis (Art.
Moneta).
J. Adrien Blanchet Documents pour servir a l'histoire monetaire
de la Navarre et du Bearn, de
1562-1629. Macon, 1887.
Hubert de Martigny De la Disparition de la monnaie d'argent et de
son remplacement par la monnaie d'or
(ou Situation Monetaire de la France
en 1859). Paris, 1859.
H. Costes Les institutions monetaires de la France avant
et depuis, 1789. Paris, 1885.
" Notes et Tableaux pour servir a l'etude de la
question monetaire. Paris, 1884.
Hippolyte Berry Etudes et recherches historiques sur les
Monnaies de France. 1853.
Natalis de Wailly Memoire sur les variations de la livre
tournois depuis S. Louis a la monnaie
decimale.
C. Bouteroue Recherches curieuses des monnayes de France
depuis le commencement de la
Monarchie. Paris, 1666.
L. Faucher Recherches sur l'or and l'argent. 1843.
Dupre de St. Maur Essai sur les monnaies ou reflexions sur le
rapport entre l'argent et les denrees.
Paris, 1746.
Abot de Bazinghen Traite des monnaies et de la jurisdiction de
la cour des monnaies. Paris, 1764.
Le Vicomte G. D'Avenel Histoire economique de la propriete, des
salaires, des denrees, etc.,
1200-1800. Paris, 1894.
For a bibliography of the works treating of the provincial monies of
France, see Vicomte D'Avenel, _ubi supra_, i. pp. 483-91.
ITALY
_Authorities._
Ignazio Orsini Storia delle monete della repubblica
fiorentina. Firenze, 1760.
" Storia delle monete de' Granduchi di Toscana.
Firenze, 1766.
Zanetti Nuova raccotta delle monete e zecche d'Italia,
5 vols. folio. 1785-89.
Custodi Scrittori Italiani d'economia politica, vol.
xiv.
F. Schweizer Serie delle monete Aquileia. 1818.
Ph. Argelatus Di monetis Italiae varior. illustr. virorum
dissertationes, 6 vols. 1750-9.
A. Cinagli Le monete de' Pape, folio. 1848.
[Fr. Vettori] Il fiorino d'oro antico illustrato. 1738.
Menizzi Delle monete de' Veneziani dal principio al
fine della loro repubblica. Venezia,
1818.
Vincenzo Padovan La numografia Veneziana sommario documentato.
Venezia, 1882.
Fr. Ed. Ercole Gnecchi Le Monete di Milano.
Catalog einer Sammlung italienischer Munzen aller Zeiten. Munich,
1882.
Nicolo Papadopoli Sulle origini della Veneta zecca, etc.
Venezia, 1882.
" Sul valore della moneta Veneziana. Venezia, 1885.
" Monete inedite della zecca Veneziana. Venezia,
1881.
G. Carli-Rubbi Delle monete e dell' instituzione delle zecche
d'Italia. L'Aja, 4 vols. 1754.
NETHERLANDS
_Authorities._
W.F. Schimmel Geschiedkundig overzicht van het muntwezen in
Nederland. Amsterdam, 1882.
[Groebe] Handleiding tot de kennis der nederlandsche
munten. Amsterdam, 1850.
[Warin] Bijdragen tot de kennis van het muntwezen ('S.
Gravenhage). 1843.
P.O. van der Chijs Beknopte verhandeling over het nut der
beoefening van de algemeene, dat is
oude, meddeleeuwsche en heden daagsche
munt en penningkunde. Leiden, 1829.
V. Gaillard Recherches sur les Monnaies de Flandres. 1857.
Groot Plakkaat Boek (Can & Schelten).
Mieris Beschrijving der Munten van Utrecht. 1726.
A. Vrolik Verslag van al het verrigte tot herstel van
het Nederlandsche Muntwezen van
1842-51.
L. Deschamps de Pas Essai sur l'histoire monetaire des Comtes de
Flandres de la maison de Bourgogne.
1863.
F. Henaux Essai sur l'histoire monetaire du pays de
Liege. 1845.
W.C. Mees Proeve eener geschiedenis van het Bankwezen en
Nederland. Rotterdam, 1838.
Kornelis van Alkemade De goude en zilvere gangbaare penningen der
Graaven en Gravinnen van Holland.
Delft, 1700.
W.J. de Voogt Bijdragen tot de numismatiek van Gelderland.
Arnhem, 1869.
R. Serrure Elements de l'histoire monetaire de Flandres.
Gand, 1879.
F. Verachter Documents pour servir a l'histoire monetaire
des Pays-Bas. Anvers, 1845.
" Histoire monetaire de la ville de Bois le Duc.
Anvers, 1845.
Revue numismatique Belge.
D. Groebe Beantwoording der Prijswerk over de Munten en
hetgeen daartoe betrekking--1500-1621
(Koninklijke Akademie van
Wetenschappen. 1835).
Inleiding tot de heedendaagsche penningkunde ofte verhandeling van der
Oorsprong van't geld, etc. Amsterdam, 1717.
Fr. van Mieris Beschrijving van der Bisschoplijke munten en
zegelen van Utrecht, etc. Leyden,
1726.
Fr. van Houwelingen Penninck-boeck enhondende alle figuren van
Silbere und Goude penningen gheslaghen
bij de Graven van Hollandt. Leyden,
1591.
J. Ackersdijck Nederlands Muntwezen, etc. Utrecht, 1845.
Ghesquiere Memoire sur trois points interessant de
l'histoire monetaire des Pays Bas,
etc. Bruxelles, 1786.
F. Den Duyts Notice sur les anciennes monnaies des Comtes
de Flandres, etc. 1847.
R.H. Chalon Recherches sur les monnaies des Comtes de
Hainault. 1843.
P.O. van der Chijs De munten der Voormalige Hertogdommen Braband
en Limburg (in vol. xxvi. of Tayler's
tweede Genootschap. Haarlem. 1851).
Van den Berg Introductory chapter to "The Silver Question."
1879.
SPAIN
_Authorities._
Breve Resena historico-critica de la moneda Espanola y reduccion de
sus valores a los del sistema metrico vigente (a Government Report
of 1862).
Juan de Dios de la Rada y Delgado Bibliografia numismatica Espanola
Madrid, 1886. (A work of unequalled
merit.)
Vicente Argueello Memoria Sobre el valor de las monedas de
D'Alfonso el Sabio (memorias de la
Real Academia de la Historia).
Edward Clarke Letters concerning the Spanish Nation. London,
1773.
J. Salat Tratado de las monedas de Catalunia.
Barcelona, 1818.
Andrea Merim Escuela Paleographica, folio. 1780.
Cascales Discursos historicos de Murcia, folio. 1621.
A. Heiss Descripcion general de las monedas
Hispano-Cristianas, 1865-9. 3 vols. (A
model work of immense labour.)
Liciniano Saez Demostracion historica del verdadero valor de
las monedas, etc. 1805 (Real Acad. de
la historia).
Dr. Clemencin On the Ratio in Spain (in Memorias de la Real
Academia de la Historia, vol. vi. p.
525).
ENGLAND AND AMERICA
R. Ruding Annals of the Coinage of Britain.
Hawkins Silver Coins of England.
Kenyon Gold Coins of England.
Numismatic Chronicle.
Lord Liverpool Treatise on the Coins of the Realm.
Sir James Stewart Works.
S.M. Leake A Historical Account of English Money.
H.N. Sealey Coins, Currency, and Banking.
Macpherson Anderson's History of Commerce.
Bishop Fleetwood Chronicon Preciosum, or an Account of English
Money, etc. etc. London, 1707
Bishop Nicolson English, Scotch, and Irish Historical
Libraries.
Thorold Rogers History of Prices.
Tooke and Newmarch History of Prices.
Sir Dudley North Discourses upon Trade. 1691.
Sir Walter Raleigh Works (Oxford Edition).
Sir Robert Cotton _Posthuma._
Harris An Essay upon Money and Coins. London, 1752.
State Papers Foreign (Record Office). (Absolutely invaluable.)
Close Rolls and Patent Rolls (Record Office).
State Papers Domestic (Record Office).
Treasury Papers (Record Office).
Reports of the Deputy-Master of the Mint, 1870-94.
United States Reports of the International
Monetary Conference. 1878. (Embodying an
invaluable series of reprints.)
J. Laurence Laughlin The History of Bimetallism in the United
States. New York, 1894.
Dunbar Laws of the United States on Currency and
Banking, etc.
Of the almost endless series of Government Reports, a full bibliography
will be found in Soetbeer's Litteraturnachweis.
The American Mint Reports, and the Austrian _Statistische Tabellen zur
Wahrungs-Frage der Osterreichisch-ungarischen Monarchie_ (Vienna, 1892),
deserve separate and special mention for their unequalled usefulness.
I am deeply indebted to H.C. Maxwell Lyte, C.B., Deputy Keeper of the
Records, for references to the Patent and Close Rolls, the Exchequer
Records, and other sources, which I have attempted to work into the
tables of the French coins (Appendix VI.).
The Index of Coins at the end of the present volume is intended mainly
for the purposes of historical research. It has been compiled, along
with the General Index, entirely by my sister, Miss Edna Shaw, to whom
my warmest thanks are due.
CONTENTS
CHAPTER I
From the Commencement of Gold Coinages to the Discovery of America,
1252-1492
Recommencement of gold coinages in Europe, 1; in Italy, 3; Germany,
6; France, 9; Flanders, 10; Holland, Spain, and England, 11;
characteristics of the first period, 13; general depreciation of the
standard, 15; monetary experience of Italy, 17; the Florentine
troubles, 18; monetary experience of Spain, 23; the Cortes of
Valladolid, 24; monetary experience of Germany, 25; the Mint
conventions, 26; tables of the groschen and gulden, 30, 31; monetary
experience of France, 31; arbitrary debasements, 32; course of the
monies under Philippe de Valois, 35; the States-General of France,
1420, 37; Charles VII., 38; Louis XI. and Charles VIII., 39; general
statement of the ratio, 40; monetary experience of England, 41;
Edward III.'s issues of gold, 42; the measures of, 1353, 45;
complaints of 1381, and the monetary investigation, 50; recoinage of
1414, 55; recoinage of Henry VI., 58.
CHAPTER II
From the Discovery of America to the End of the First Cycle of the
Influence of the Metals of the New World on European Currencies,
1493-1660
General characteristics: First movement of metals from the New
World, 61; mercantile importance of the Netherlands, 63; statistics
of the production of the precious metals, 65; statement of the Mint
ratio, 69; operation of the Netherlands plakkaats, 71; list of
ditto, 76; tables of ditto, 79; monetary experience of France, 83;
course of the monies under Henry II. and Charles IX., 84; the
States-General of 1575, 87; Henry III.'s reform of 1577, 88; checked
by Henry IV., 1602, 89; the monetary experience of 1614, and reform
of 1615, 90; recoinage of 1640, 91; Florence, 93; Germany, 95; table
of the groschen and gulden, 97; Imperial Mint Ordinances of 1524,
1551, and 1559, 98, 99; Mint disorders, 100; _Kipper und Wipper
Zeit_, 102; Imperial basis of 1623, 106; Spain, 107; her function
as a distributor, 108; England 113; tables of gold and silver coins,
113; recoinage of 1527, 118; export of 1537, 119; measures of 1544,
121; the Tudor debasement, 123; Elizabeth's recoinage, 1559, 129;
the mistake of 1600, remedied by James I., 132; export of 1607 and
1611, Sir Walter Raleigh's opinions, 134; crisis of 1620-22, 139;
the State prosecutions of 1638, 148; the troubles of 1649 and 1652,
151.
CHAPTER III
From the End of the First Cycle of American Influences to the Present
Day, 1660-1894
Statistics of the production of the precious metals, 154; statement
of the ratio, 157; development of theory of international trade,
160; free trade in the precious metals, 163; place of discount and
interest rates in the modern system, 165; monetary experience of
France, 167; recoinages of 1689, 1726, and 1785, 168; Calonne's
ratio, 172; monetary action of Republican France, 173; the law of
1803, 176; bimetallic experiences, 1803-76, 179; movements and
mintings of the metals, 183; measures of 1835, 187; French monetary
commissions, 188; formation of the Latin Union, 190; its history,
193; Germany, 197; Zinnaische standard, 199; Leipzig standard, 1690,
200; Austrian or Convention standard, 201; South German standard,
202; Prussian standard, 203; Conference of Munich, 1837, 204; Mint
conventions of Dresden, 1838, and of Vienna, 1857, 205-212;
agitation of 1857-70, 213; new Imperial system, 215; England, 219;
recoinage of 1696, 222; Newton's report, 1717, 229; recoinage of
1774, 233; silver legislation, 237; Bank Restriction and the Act of
1816, 240; movements and mintings of the metals, 244; United States,
246; beginnings of a national system, 247; reports of Morris and
Hamilton, 249-251; Act of 1792, 253; gold export and the law of
1834, 255; silver export and the law of 1853 and 1873, 259; Acts of
1878, 1890, and 1893, 262; movements and mintings of the metals,
265; Netherlands, 268; Portugal, 272; the international conferences,
274; Paris conferences of 1867, 1878, and 1881, 275-280; Brussels
Conference of 1892, 285; India, 293; her historic function, 293;
movements and mintings of the metals, 299.
APPENDICES
PAGE
APPENDIX I. The Monetary System of Florence, 1272-1530 301
" II. " " Venice, 1284-1790 310
" III. " " Spain, 1250-1894 319
" IV. " " the Netherlands, 1250-1894 345
" V. " " Germany, Austria, and
Prussia, 1250-1894 360
" VI. " " France, 1140-1894 396
THE HISTORY OF CURRENCY
CHAPTER I
From the Commencement of Gold Coinages to the Discovery of America,
1252-1492
The monetary history of Europe begins in the thirteenth century, and in
the Italian peninsula. Its starting-point is the era of the
reintroduction of gold into the coinages of the Western nations, and is
definitely marked for us by the minting of the gold florin of Florence
in 1252. For all practical purposes gold had gone out of use since the
seventh century, and after the submersion of the Roman Empire; and the
currencies of the nations of mediaeval Europe rested on a silver basis
entirely. There are limitations to the truth of this statement, but they
are of such a nature as not materially to affect it. In Spain, for
instance, the Moors kept up a tradition of gold coinage similar to that
of Rome, from the eighth to the middle of the thirteenth century. But
its influence on the monetary system of Christian Spain is not even a
matter of question. At the other extremity of the Mediterranean, at
Byzantium, seat of the Eastern Empire, the best traditions of the
coinage system of Rome were preserved for centuries after the imperial
city had fallen before the invasions of the northern barbarians. Indeed,
the monetary system of the Eastern empire, by becoming, as it did, the
model which Charlemagne copied in his currency enactments, became the
basis of all the modern European systems. Further than this, the
presence of gold _Byzants_ can be traced here and there, at isolated
points and dates, all over the darkness of those early centuries of the
Middle Ages, when all coining art seemed forgotten among the races of
Central Europe.
Notwithstanding such limitations, however, it still remains true that
the monetary history of the modern world dates from the thirteenth and
not the seventh century, and from the little commercial states of Italy
rather than from Byzantium. Previous to the minting of the gold florin
of Florence there is no trace of any independent minting of gold coins
on a commercial scale by any state of mediaeval central Europe. The
currency system of England, for instance, from the time of the Saxons to
the days of Henry III. was based entirely on silver. In endless variety
and under a diversity of names the silver penny was the unit coin
current of the realm. Its equivalent in the Frankish Empire was the
silver denarius, which Charlemagne had made the unit of his system, and
which so continued for both the kingdom of France and the Holy Roman
Empire till the fourteenth century. Finally, among the numerous states
of Italy, with each their little independent Mint, there is no trace of
the coinage of gold until the days of the commercial greatness of
Florence and Venice. For eight centuries or more those races of Europe,
which were to turn the course of the modern world and build its
civilisation anew, were ignorant of the commercial use of what has been
through all history the most potent factor in civilisation--gold.
[Sidenote: THE GOLD FLORIN OF FLORENCE]
The explanation of the reintroduction and recoinage of gold is to be
found in the history of the Crusades and of the commercial growth of the
petty independent states which sprang from the political confusion of
Italy. No sooner had they achieved each their little autonomous
existence than they threw themselves with feverish energy into the
development of the trade with the East. Florence and Venice, Pisa and
Genoa, led the way and reaped the fruits; and it was in her most
flourishing time, when she had conquered her rivals, Pisa and Siena, and
was enjoying a prosperous peace and active trade, that Florence, at the
instance of the chief of her merchants, resolved on the coining of the
gold florin (1252).[1]
The mere idea of such a gold coinage could only be derived from the
East--from Byzantium. But it is a curious fact that the importation of
it should be due in the first place to the Crusades. Frederick II. of
Sicily was elected Emperor of the Holy Roman Empire in 1212. Sixteen
years later he headed the Fifth Crusade, and the gold coin (_Augustale_)
which he issued some time between his return from that crusade and his
death, probably commemorates his wish to rival the appearance of
opulence of the Eastern court. This Sicilian coin is the direct ancestor
of the florin of Florence, and to it would fitly belong the honour of
leading in a new era, were it not that the superior beauty of the
Florentine coin gave it universal currency and reputation, and
extinguished the memory of its predecessor.
The gold coin of Genoa (_Genoviva_) is supposed to have issued in the
same year as the florin (1252). Five years later (1257) Henry III. of
England imitated the florin in his gold _pennies_, and more than thirty
years (31st October 1284) later Venice followed the lead of Florence and
instituted a coinage of gold _zecchinos_, under the dogeship of Giovanni
Dandolo.
Two conditions were essential to the bringing about so momentous a
revolution as this, however little the mind of contemporaries may have
known it as such. In the first place, the foreign trade of the Italian
republics must have become so extensive as to demand a currency medium
of higher denomination than silver; and, secondly, that trade must have
developed in such directions as to tap gold-using or gold-bearing
regions in order to supply the Italian mints. It is a curious fact that
both these conditions were realised through the instrumentality of the
Crusades. The quickening effect of these vast movements on the trade of
the Mediterranean is well known, but their influence in the second
direction has not hitherto been pointed out. In the Fourth Crusade
Venice lent the force which captured Byzantium (1203), and when, by her
arms, Baldwin, Count of Flanders, had been seated on the Eastern throne,
Venice reaped her reward in three-eighths of the territories of the
Eastern Empire. She received Peloponnesus and a chain of islands in the
AEgean, and by the hold she had on Constantinople secured the virtual
control of the Black Sea. In its turn the control of the Black Sea
brought with it the monopoly of the overland trade with India.
[Sidenote: THE TRADE OF VENICE]
At one and the same moment, therefore, Venice acquired possession of a
huge treasure of gold wrested from the conquered city, and of the then
only gold-yielding districts--the Crimea--and of an intercolonial trade,
demanding a more enhanced currency medium. The result of such a
combination of circumstances was irresistible. During the continuance of
the "Latin Empire" at Byzantium, Venice and her sister state were
practically the only merchants of Europe.
The institution of a gold coinage among the Italian republics,
therefore, marks for us an era of commercial expansion which is only
fitly to be compared with that of Holland in the seventeenth century,
or of our own country in modern times.
We are not concerned with tracing the effects of this extraordinary
movement further than as they bore in their train the dower of a
currency of gold.
In the European system, Venice was the intermediary between the
spice-laden east and the wool-bearing north. England, the wool-growing
country of fourteenth-century Europe; Flanders, the home of the weaving
industry; the Hanse Towns of Germany and the gradually forming kingdom
of France were successively brought face to face with the new medium of
currency; and if the story of the gradual adoption of that new medium
could be written, it would form one of the most instructive of all
chapters of currency and commercial history.
As it is, we have only uncertain and scattered data.
In the case of Germany--of chief importance in the process by reason of
her geographical position midway between the Mediterranean and the
north--the first minting of gold in imitation of the Italian states fell
in the second quarter of the fourteenth century. Of the two types of
gold monies issued by the Emperor Louis IV., surnamed "Bavarian," the
first, struck some short time before 1328, was in direct imitation of
the florin of Florence. The second, struck some little time later, was a
copy of the _ecu d'or_ of Philip VI. of France.
In 1337 our own King Edward was made vicar-general and lieutenant to the
Emperor, with powers to coin monies of gold and silver. He accordingly
kept his winter at the Castle of Louvain, and caused great sums of money
both of gold and silver to be coined at Antwerp. Two years later, this
same Emperor Louis, the Bavarian, granted to the Duke Rainhold of
Gueldres the right to mint gold coins, "after the valuation of the gold
monies of the Archbishop of Cologne, the Duke of Brabant, and the Counts
of Hainault and Holland." In the following year he granted to the free
state of Luebeck a similar right--the patent expressly stipulating that
their gold coins should not exceed in weight or value the gold florin of
Florence.
[Sidenote: BEGINNINGS OF A GOLD COINAGE IN GERMANY]
Sixteen years later (1356) the general liberty of coining gold was
conceded to the seven Electoral Princes by the Golden Bull of the
Emperor Charles IV., and subsequently state after state and free town
after free town purchased or were granted the right. Even as late as
1372, in the patent granting to Frederick of Nuernberg this so eagerly
solicited liberty, the stipulation is made that the gold gulden to be
coined should be of as good gold and weight as "the gulden or florin of
Florence."
In the case of Luebeck direct documentary evidence of transactions
relating to the introduction of a gold coinage has survived among the
archives of that state. The privilege of a Mint and of coining (of
silver) was first granted to Luebeck by Frederick II. in 1226. But it was
not until a century and more later that Louis the Bavarian, by his bull
of 28th November 1340, conceded the right of coining gold "in pieces
which were to be neither heavier nor of higher worth than the florin of
Florence." On the 8th September in the following year the Luebeck Mint
made its first purchase of gold from a certain Jacob Grell of Zuetphen in
Holland. The purchase consisted of 4 marks 1 loth 8 pfen. weight of gold
(Luebeck weight), and the price paid was 24 solidi the carat. In other
parcels, up to Michaelmas of 1341, the authorities remitted to the Mint
a total weight of metal of 50 marks 2 oz. 3-1/2 ang., varying in
fineness from 15 to 23 carats. The consignment yielded in the pot 46
marks 1 oz. 7 ang. of pure metal, and was coined into 3199 pieces of a
total weight of 47 marks 5 oz. 10 ang., being 67.08 gold pieces to the
Luebeck mark. The coins were issued on the 18th February 1342, and bore
on the one side the lily of Florence and on the other the figure of John
the Baptist--all in direct imitation of the florin. The total issues
made in the immediately succeeding years from the Luebeck Mint were:--
1342 24,783 florins 67.26 to the mark.
" 5,483 " 67.11 " "
1343 30,436 " " " "
1344 32,590 " " " "
With more or less irregularity the earliest German guldens imitated the
florin, and maintained something like a steady and uniform denomination
quite up to the beginning of the last quarter of the fourteenth
century.
[Sidenote: GOLD COINAGE IN FRANCE]
In France, as in Germany, the first coining of gold can only be dated
approximately, but for all practical purposes quite safely. The
generally accepted view is that the French series of gold coins was
initiated in 1254 by Louis IX., "St. Louis," and that the issue was
connected with the Sixth Crusade which he had headed five years before.
There is documentary evidence extant to disprove this. _Florins d'or
appelez Florences_ are mentioned as early as 1180, not vaguely but quite
definitely with an exact statement of weight standard and equivalence.
Unless the record of the first minting of the gold florin at Florence is
untrustworthy the coin here referred to can only be an imitation in gold
of the silver florin of Florence. The same document which contains this
reference (De Saulcy, i. 115) also specifies _petits royaux d'or_ as
minted not only in 1180 by Philip Augustus, but also in the days of his
father, Louis VII. Similar mention of at least two gold coins of Louis
IX. occurs as early as 1226, one evidently of the florin type, the other
a _pavillon d'or_. It is quite safe to assert, however, that these coins
were for show merely, due to an emulation of Byzantine and Italian
opulence, and indicate no wide or commercial employment of gold. Of the
gold florins of 1226, for instance, thirteen pieces were struck, twelve
for twelve peers of France as a gift, the thirteenth for the King
himself, "and know you that this is the most beautiful money that can be
found, and the finest and best engraved." The interest of such issues is
entirely numismatic and not commercial or monetary.[2] It is not until
late in the reign of St. Louis--until 1265 or thereabouts--that there is
mention in France of any such gold coinage as could have this commercial
rather than merely numismatic importance. For the purposes of metallic
or currency history proper the real starting-point for France is marked
rather by the _gros royaux d'or_, coined in 1295 by Philip le Bel, than
by the more meagre coinage of St. Louis and his predecessors. The _gros
royaux_ of Philip were double the value of the _petits royaux_ of St.
Louis, of which latter Philip le Bel speaks thus in his proclamation.
"We have commanded to be made in our name money of gold after the
_petits royaux d'or_, which shall be 70 to the Paris mark and cut as the
_petits royaux_ have been used to be, being issued at an equivalence of
11 sols Parisi." From this date (1295) onward the gold coinage of the
French Mint became one of the most important factors in the monetary
history of Europe.
In Flanders the first gold coins were struck in 1357, under the rule of
Count Louis II.[3] Both the coins issued by him are copied directly from
French types----his _real au lion_ from the French _ecu_ of Philip IV.,
and his _mouton d'or_ from the French coin of the same name. And it was
the same French original which furnished the types to William V., Count
of Holland (1356-77), when he followed the fashion and coined gold. Of
the six types minted by Count William during his reign, two are an
imitation of the French _mouton_, and the last is derived from the
universally prevailing type, the florin.
[Sidenote: GOLD COINAGE IN SPAIN AND ENGLAND]
In Spain the first coining of gold by the Christian powers fell in the
same epoch and derived from the same source. Alfonso XI. (1312-50),
surnamed the "Noble," was the first King of Castille who coined the _oro
gran modulo_ (_doblas de oro_), while in Aragon Pedro IV. (1336-87),
"the Ceremonious," in his _oro florines_ directly imitated the
Florentine type, though his later pieces are more original in design.
Finally, with regard to England,--to whose monetary history a central
importance attaches,--the course of events was most evidently controlled
by the revolution in the continental currencies. It is, at the same
time, comparatively easy to ascertain. The first of our kings to issue
gold coins was Henry III., who in 1257 coined a penny of fine gold, of
the weight of two silver pennies of the time, and ordered it to be
current for twenty pence.
There can be no doubt that the idea of such a coinage was derived from
that of St. Louis of France; and, just as in France, the issue seems to
have been premature. Probably neither in the one country nor the other
did there exist a sufficient store of the precious metal itself, nor
sufficient activity of trade to attract such a store, or indeed to make
a gold coinage at all a matter of mercantile advantage. It is only a
developed and active or considerable trade that demands so enhanced a
medium of exchange. Accordingly, just as in France, there is a
noticeable gap between the first actual minting of gold by the
predecessors of St. Louis, and the minting of it in such quantities as
to make a factor in commercial and monetary history, in the days of
Philip le Bel (1295); so, in England, the first issue of Henry III. was
followed by an interval of nearly ninety years, during which no coinage
of gold by our kings took place. The real introducer of this metal into
English currency and commerce was Edward III., and the first practical
issue of it is to be dated in 1344, rather than 1257. It will be seen at
a glance what this statement implies. The issue of Henry III. in 1257
had been premature--an act of kingly rivalry and show, rather than of
commercial necessity. But the succeeding century saw a rapid development
in the commerce of Northern Europe, and a gold coinage had gradually
become both a possibility and a necessity. One after the other--in the
order of time just detailed--the various commercial states with which
England had intercourse had adopted it and profited by it. That England
should follow in the movement scarcely more than sixteen years later
than Germany, and a year or two before Flanders, is some evidence of the
organisation of her trade, as well as of the intimacy of
inter-commercial relationships. So purely a matter of trade and natural
growth was this vast movement of the adoption of a gold coinage--a
revolution indeed as it proved, though yet unwritten, more momentous in
its influence on European civilisation than either the Renaissance or
the Reformation.
[Sidenote: CHARACTERISTICS OF THE FIRST PERIOD]
Approximately, therefore, the fourteenth century may be taken as the
starting-point for a history of European bimetallism. The first period
of that history embraces all the movements of the previous metals, from
such starting-point up to the discovery of America in 1492--a matter of
two centuries, roughly speaking.
The characteristics of this period are perfectly well defined, and
repeat themselves with almost faithful and exact similarity of
recurrence in the several states comprising the Europe of that date. In
brief, such characteristics were those of--(1) a period of commercial
expanse, necessitating an increasing currency and advancing prices; (2)
a period of stationary production of the precious metals, necessitating
a struggle among the various states for the possession of those metals;
(3) a period of endless change in the ratio between gold and silver,
necessitating continual revision of the rate of exchange. Broadly
speaking, those characteristics fall into two classes, accordingly as
they relate to--(1) the natural movement of prices i.e. having regard
merely to the supply of the precious metals; (2) to the unnatural
struggle for the metals themselves--for the material for currency--due
to international rivalry and bad or crafty legislation.
With regard to the former of these, the period was distinctly one of
insufficient and relatively diminishing production of the metals. During
these two centuries, 1300-1500, the main sources of the derivation of
gold were the Eastern trade and the finds on the eastern shores and
northern interior of Africa. The chief supply of silver came from the
mines in Germany. These latter--in Hungary, Transylvania, Saxony, and
Bohemia--were of such importance and activity, in the fifteenth century
and towards the time of the discovery of America, as partially to keep
pace with the general trade expanse of the time, thereby helping to
arrest a fall of prices that would have been absolutely disastrous to
the civilisation of Europe. The combined production during this period
cannot even be conjectured. At the close of it--during the reign of
Henry VII.--the total coinage of England, both silver and gold, did not
probably exceed L3,000,000, while the total stock of both metals in
Europe in 1492 has been estimated at no more than L33,400,000. These
figures stand alone, for we have no idea of the extent of the commerce
which was worked on so small a monetary basis, and very little idea of
the amount of aid which was extended to metallic money by such
expedients as bills of exchange. To estimate, therefore, whether the
period was one of depreciating, stationary, or appreciating currency, we
are reduced to the testimony of prices and the Mint records.
[Sidenote: COURSE OF MONETARY DEPRECIATION]
In France, at the beginning of the period (in 1308), the mark of gold
was coined into 44 livres, and the mark of silver into 2 livres 19 sols.
At the close of the period, or towards it, in 1475, the mark of gold was
coined into 118 livres 10 sols, and that of silver into 10 livres.
In Germany the mark of gold was coined into 66 gulden of 23 carats in
1386, and into 71-1/3 gulden of 18-1/2 carats in 1495--a depreciation of
34.36 per cent. In Spain the mark of silver was coined into 130
maravedis in the year 1312, and into 2210 maravedis in 1474. This latter
case is, however, so inextricably complicated with considerations of
mere, i.e. arbitrary, debasement, as to render it useless for any
estimation of the natural appreciation of the metals. In England our
earliest gold coin weighed 128-4/7 grains, and was tariffed at 6s. 8d.
In 1489, 80 grains of gold were equivalent to the same, 6s. 8d.--a
reduction of 37.94 per cent. Within the same period the weight of the
silver penny sank from 22 to 12 troy grains, a reduction of 45.45 per
cent. Eliminating cases of arbitrary debasement, a rough average for the
period might fairly give 40 per cent. of depreciation through the two
centuries.
The case need hardly be laboured statistically, for the legislative
history of all the countries forming the circle of commercial Europe in
the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries witnesses this general downward
movement--this appreciation and restriction of currency--in grim and
unmistakable manner; and it is the expression of this general movement
in their legislations that gives the test and measure of the earliest
bimetallic troubles of Europe. In many ways the problem before the
various Governments was a more difficult one than that which besets the
modern world. There was, for instance, nothing like an equal and
generally recognised ratio of value between gold and silver prevailing
at any one single point of time. At one and the same date a ratio of 7
or 8 to 1 prevailed in the Moorish parts of Spain, and 12 to 1 in the
Christian parts (the kingdom of Castile). Similarly, at a later period,
in 1474, the ratio in England was 11.15, in Germany 11.12, and in France
11.00, in Italy 10.58, and in Spain 9.82.
The natural result of such a state of chaos, if it had been permitted to
work itself out unhindered, would have been arbitrage transactions of
such a nature--a flux and reflux of the European currencies so
perpetual--as would have induced a yearly and universal bankruptcy. In
spite of frantic efforts on the part of ruler after ruler, such results
did partially come about, and they sufficiently account both for the
distraction of Governments and the hatred universally visited upon the
Jew in the Middle Ages. The measures which were adopted by the various
States to counteract this invisible, insidious, and wasting process,
partake of the roughness and unscientific character of the age. The
export of gold and silver was forbidden on pain of death; and it was no
mere paper threat, for prominent London merchants were drawn and
quartered for the offence. The rates of exchange of foreign coins were
fixed by proclamation, and the office of exchanger limited to a
particular place. When all this proved ineffectual, the coins were cried
down, and violent and sudden changes in the ratio enacted. What made the
jerk and friction of such a process worse was that such measures were
not merely defensive, but intentionally offensive. The wish of the
fourteenth and fifteenth century ruler was not merely to defend his own
stock of precious metals from depletion, but--having gained the
conviction of the insufficiency of the production of those metals for
the needs of Europe--to attract to himself the stock of his neighbours
by whatever craft. There was a general struggle for the coverlid of
gold, and the methods of that struggle were almost barbaric in their
rudeness, violence, craft, and dishonourableness.
Italy.
On account of their knowledge and practice of the science of exchanges
and finance, the metallic history of the Italian states is of chief
importance for this earliest period. At a time when the northern nations
show signs of an infancy of commerce merely, Italy was advanced in the
art and practice of a most highly developed commercial and financial
state. It is to her that we owe our system of book-keeping and the use
of bills of exchange, not to speak of the pawnbroking and funding
systems; and it is permissible to conjecture that Italy, keeping her
finger as she did on the monetary pulsations of Europe, reaped her
harvest, and far the largest harvest, from the bimetallic fluctuations
of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. In their turn those
fluctuations acted on herself, and occasionally disastrously. On account
of their pre-eminence as the commercial states of the peninsula,
Florence and Venice are chosen to illustrate in brief the monetary
history of Italy. The account of the general course of depreciation in
both these states, and of the fluctuations of Mint rates is given in the
Appendix (Nos. I. and II.). As regards the bimetallic influence of these
changes of rates, there is one telling record in the history of
Florence.
[Sidenote: THE FLORENTINE TROUBLES OF 1345]
The second quarter of the fourteenth century witnessed a decided rise in
the value of silver as against gold. It told immediately upon Florence,
on account of her Mint rates. By the regulation of 1324 the ratio in
Florence was 13.62, whereas in France the ratio was approximately 12.6,
and twenty years later, 1344, hardly more than 11 in both France and
England. The result on Florence was immediate, and silver disappeared
from circulation. In 1345, says her historian, Villani, there was great
scarcity. There was no silver money with the exception of the
_quattrini_. It was all melted down and transported. Silver of the alloy
of 11-1/2 oz. fine was worth in other parts out of Florence more than 12
_lire a fiorino_, whence arose great discontent to the woollen
merchants, who feared that the gold florin, in which they received their
foreign payments, should fall too much. Being a powerful factor in the
little state, they agitated, and the recoinage of 1345 was the result.
The precedent evil and the remedy applied by this recoinage may be thus
illustrated:--
By law--
Fiorino d'oro = 29 soldi.
20 of these soldi = la lira a fiorino.
Therefore 12 lire a fiorino
(the price of the libbra
of silver as above, purchased
abroad) = 8 fiorini 8 soldi.
= 26 lire 8 soldi di piccioli.
One fiorino d'oro being then current for about 3 lire 2 soldi piccioli.
The silver species current in Florence in 1345 were _quattrini_ and
_Guelfi del fiore_. These coins were of the same standard as above
(11-1/2 oz.), were coined at a tale of 167 to the libbra, and issued at
an equivalence of 30 piccioli. The libbra of this silver, therefore, by
Florentine Mint rate was valued at 20 _lire_ 17 _soldi_ 6 _denari di
piccioli_. Abroad, therefore, the price of silver was a matter of
slightly more than 5 lire higher than in Florence.
The same result could be got by taking the billon money of Florence and
calculating from its silver contents.
The natural result was a disappearance of silver. The only remedy was a
recoinage, and this was applied by the law of 19th August 1345. By this
law the standard of 11-1/2 oz. was retained, the tale of the _Grossi_
was increased to 134 pieces to the libbra (132 being rendered to the
merchant, and 2 retained for Mint expenses), and each piece issued at an
equivalence of 4 soldi.
4 x 132 = 528 soldi.
(= 26 lire 8 soldi di piccioli.)
It will be seen at a glance that this equalised the internal and
external price of silver.
Rather strangely this enactment of the 19th of August was followed by
another no more than four days later (23rd August 1345), by which a
slight reactionary change was made in favour of silver. The tale was
decreased from 134 to 132 pieces, to be struck from the libbra of the
same standard, and issuable at the same equivalence.
Slight as the backward change was, it was sufficient to leave the
monetary system exposed to the same influence of differential
exchanging, and within two months it had to be repealed by the law of
October 1345. Under the name of _Nuovi Guelfi_ a fresh coin was thereby
instituted of the same standard and equivalence as above, but at a tale
of 142 per libbra (140 being rendered back to the merchant, and 2
retained for expenses of coinage).
140 x 4 = 560 piccioli.
(= 28 lire di piccioli.)
This established a considerable advantage, and turned the flow of silver
back again to Florence.
[Sidenote: FLORENCE IN 1345]
The process might in many respects be compared to our raising of the
bank rate, were it not that the two operations represent quite different
and separated financial epochs. It is noteworthy, too, because the
process will be found immediately imitated in both France and England,
that these laws of 1345 represent preponderatingly the sense of the
class of exchangers of Florence,--i.e. the financiers professed,--men
who would profit individually in their exchange operations as much as
the state would in its restored currency of silver. "The above lords,"
says the preamble to the first-cited Act, "considering the numerous
petitions made to them by many artificers, merchants, and honourable
citizens, of the incredible lack of silver money in the state of
Florence, on account of which the citizens of the said state suffer many
inconveniences and wants, have determined to have and have had counsel
of the twenty-one guilds of the city, who have [by a roundabout method]
chosen eight men, skilled and prudent in the aforesaid, who have had
counsel with the officers of our Mint and with certain others of the
trade of exchangers," etc., with such result as above.
Yet even so, the effort was only temporarily successful. Before two
years was out the price of silver abroad, outside of Florence, had
advanced to 12 _lire_ 15 _soldi a fiorino_ = 27 _lire_ 14 _soldi di
piccioli_, whereas the price fixed by a fresh Mint law of 1345 had been
again reduced to under 26 _lire_ 10 _soldi di piccioli_. The result was
a second melting down and disappearance of the silver coins of the
state, a second agitation on the part of the Florentine woollen
merchants, and renewed legislation.
By the Mint regulation of 1347, a new-named money was introduced called
_Guelfi Grossi_, coined at a tale of 117 to the libbra (111-3/5 being
rendered cash to the merchants, and 5-2/5 retained by the Mint for the
state), at the same standard as before (11-1/2 oz.), but at an
equivalence of 5 instead of, as previously, 4 piccioli per piece.
117 x 5 = 585 piccioli.
(= 29 lire 5 soldi di piccioli);
a figure which is considerably above the 27 _lire_ 14 _soldi piccioli_,
which Villani gives as the price of foreign silver at the time. Even
taking the lower tale of 111-3/5 pieces, which the importer of silver to
the Mint got for his bullion, there is a distinct margin of profit.
111-3/5 = 558 piccioli.
(= 27 lire 18 soldi di piccioli.)
Indeed, in its entirety, this operation of 1347 has a sinister look. At
home the woollen merchants of Florence were obliged to pay wages in
silver, abroad to receive payment in gold. It was to their interest to
cry down the equivalence of silver; they paid less and received more.
The means by which they brought the state to put upon silver a price so
far removed from the market price could only be the bribe contained in
the relinquishing of 5-2/3 pieces in each libbra. But such a process is
in reality the beginning of debasement.
If this is not the true import of the Act of 1347, it testifies all the
more to the only other possible motive--the monetary straits of
Florence, her want of silver for currency, and the violent effort she
was prepared to make to get it.
Whether by way of effect or cause it is hard to say, but certainly
silver in the middle of the succeeding century had so far disappeared in
the Italian peninsula, or gold so far increased during the fifteenth
century, that the commercial ratio remained persistently low--1: 9.25,
both in Milan and Florence; and the Mint regulations of 1460 adopted by
the latter state (see under table of Florentine silver coins, Appendix),
can only be looked upon as a simple repetition of the measures of 1345
and 1347.
Spain.
The currency history of Spain up to the conquest of America is one long
list of alterations in the coinage, and of petitions from merchants and
various Cortes for or against changes in the rating of the coins. The
_oro gran modulo_ was rated at 100 pesetas, under Alfonso XI. of
Castile, 1312-50, and at 1000 under his successor, Peter the Cruel,
1350-69. The _oro dobla Castellana_ was rated at 60 pesetas under Henry
II., 1369-74; at 40 under Henry the Crafty, 1390-1406; and at 100 under
John II., 1406-54. In the case of this country the troubles in the
fourteenth century arose from the proximity of France, the circulation
of lower-rated French coins, and the consequent depletion of the
treasure of the kingdom. In Aragon, for instance, the charter of Peter
IV. in 1346 had ordered the coining of gold after the same weight and
fineness as of the florin of Florence. It was found too high, and three
years later he was obliged to cancel it by another proclamation,
ordering his own gold coins to be made of the same weight and fineness
as the _ecus_ of the French kings. The close of his reign and the early
part of that of his successor witnessed acute crisis and distress, which
led to Henry II.'s celebrated reduction of the coinage at the Cortes of
Medina del Campo in 1371.
In 1391-93 another general proclamation was issued, ordering a reduction
of the value of the monies and fixing new rules of exchange, and this
was followed by one in 1398, prohibiting the circulation of foreign
coins in Spain, except at bullion value. This latter was a common
device, as will be seen in the case of our own country. It proved
ineffectual to prevent the outflow of the metals, and when re-enacted in
1413 was found to be of as little avail. The Cortes of 1442 (Valladolid)
complained bitterly, in a petition, of the money drawn away from the
realm by foreign merchants, and in the same year a fresh ordinance was
issued to readjust the values of the native monies to the foreign coins.
In this schedule, _doblas de la Banda_ were rated at 100 _maravedis_,
and the _florin d'oro d'Aragon_ at 65 _maravedis_. In 1473, only thirty
or so years later, by the charter of Henry IV., issued at Segovia, these
coins were rated at 300 and 200 _maravedis_ respectively. It was only
with the advent of the Catholic sovereigns that the internal disorder
and want of unity of the Spanish system was effectually remedied, in the
very hour of that discovery of a new world which was to put upon Spain
the vital function of distributing the new stores of precious metals
(see account of Spanish monies, Appendix III.).
Germany.
The movements of the precious metals in Germany--which, as far as the
ratio of the two metals is concerned, may be held to include the
Netherlands up to 1552, when Flanders withdrew from the monetary system
of the Holy Roman Empire--is a record of exactly the same process of
natural and gradual appreciation of the _metal_ (i.e. depreciation of
the weight and fineness of the _coin_) as in Spain, France, and England.
In the accompanying tables the movement of silver is illustrated by
means of the groschen, and that of gold by the Rhenish gulden. These
coins, it need hardly be said, were not unit coins, nor sole prevailing.
They are chosen from the bewildering variety with which the numerous
independent Mints of Germany have succeeded in perplexing posterity, as
being of relatively greater repute and wider acceptance, and because it
is a simply impossible task to combine all the denominations of these
coins, in order to deduce an average.
Up to 1375 the German gold coin was minted in close imitation of the
Florentine florin. The weight was 53 grs., as was that of the Florentine
piece; and the lily and St. John, the guardian saint of Florence, were
both employed in the two coins, the German piece being indeed issued at
first under the denomination, _Florin d'or_.
From the above-named date, however, and onwards, each succeeding and
various power altered type, weight, or alloy, with more or less
arbitrariness, but always to the increasing of the confusion of the
system as a whole. And it was to remedy this confusion, or to reduce it
somewhat, that the monetary union of the four electoral princes of the
Rhine was established (8th June 1386), under the lead of the three
towns, Frankfort, Speyer, and Worms; under which the four princes,
Frederick, Archbishop of Cologne, Carl, Archbishop of Treves, Adolf,
Archbishop of Mainz, and Rupert, Count Palatine of the Rhine, agreed
upon a common minting of gold gulden. According to the treaty, 66 such
gulden were to be minted from the Cologne mark of gold, each of the
alloy of 22 carats 6 grs. gold, and 1 carat 6 grs. silver. In 1402 this
coinage was confirmed at Mainz by the Mint edict of Rupert II.[4]
Seven years later, 1409, the three spiritual electors, Frederick,
Archbishop of Cologne, John, Archbishop of Mainz, and Werner, Archbishop
of Treves, made a new and slightly different treaty, for the purpose of
again reducing the alloy of the gulden from 22-1/2 to 22 carats.
At this rate the system was, in the same year, at Speyer, formally
accepted for themselves by the Netherlands, and at Cologne also, in
1409, by the Empire generally.
The detailed and various changes which the independent princes and
powers of Germany subsequently made, it is out of the question to
follow. To instance only in brief. In 1419 Frederick of Brandenburg
ordered the coining of gulden for his own states, at the rate of 64-1/2
to the Cologne mark, and of the fineness of 19 carats--a very
considerable reduction in the metal value of the coin. In 1422, only
three years later, Sigismund was coining gulden 66-1/2 to the mark and
22 carats 6 grs. fine--a value somewhat higher than that accepted for
the empire in 1409. In 1428-29, accordingly, the Emperor Sigismund
issued an imperial order, which was formally adopted by the Reichstag
meeting at Eger (1437) and Nuernberg (1438), by which the Cologne mark
was to be coined into 68 gulden and the fineness reduced to 19 carats.
Four years later, 1442, the Emperor Frederick IV. projected a further
reform and reduction, proposing to coin 72 pieces of 19 carats fine, but
this was not carried into effect, probably as exaggerating the average
depreciation of the content of the coin (or appreciation of the metal).
The rate, therefore, established by Sigismund practically remained in
force for a matter of sixty years.
In the diet of 1495-97 (at Worms), however, a further slight reduction
in weight and fineness took place, 69-1/3 pieces being struck out of the
Cologne mark, and the fineness lowered to 18 carats 10 grs.
On the whole, therefore, the movement of gold during these two centuries
is remarkably sluggish in Germany, putting aside, i.e., the internal
variations between state and state; and remarkably corresponding to, and
confirmatory of, that in England. And in all probability the mean of the
quantities in the two countries would aptly measure the perfectly
natural or normal appreciation of gold (depreciation of the content of
fine metal in the current gold coin) throughout the period.
The movement of silver during the same two hundred years, 1300-1500, is
much more excited, but shows an average or mean appreciation that
tallies remarkably with that of gold just described, as also with that
of silver in England. The various denominations of silver coins which
arose in Germany, in those years, make it a work of extreme difficulty
even to attempt averages. In the accompanying tables, therefore, the
groschen is taken as most fairly averaging and widely current in the
empire. In its first form, the _Gros Tournois_, struck at Tours, in
France, this coin contained 55-1/10 parts of a Cologne mark, and was of
the fineness of 15 loth 6 grs. In 1296, when it was first adopted in
Germany (in Bohemia, and Meissen), 63-1/2 pieces were struck from the
mark, and the fineness had been reduced to 15 loth. Its subsequent
variations, up to the time of the discovery of America, are detailed in
the accompanying table and in Appendix No. V., the principal points in
which are marked by the years 1341, 1378 (a notable attempt at
reformation by Charles IV. and Wenceslaus), 1390, 1412, and 1444
(marking also an attempt at reformation by treaty between the Duke of
Saxony and the Margrave of Meissen).
MOVEMENTS OF SILVER IN GERMANY, 1300-1500, AS ILLUSTRATED BY THE
GROSCHEN.
+----------+-----------+---------+--------------------+
| |The Cologne| Of Alloy| Equivalent Value |
| | Mark | |(as expressed in the|
| Date. |coined into| |20-Florin Standard).|
| +-----------+---------+----------+---------+
| | Pieces. |Loth. Qr.|Kreutzers.|Pfennige.|
+----------+-----------+---------+----------+---------+
| 1226 | 55-1/10 | 5 6 | 21 |0-216/551|
| (Gros | | | | |
| Tournois | | | | |
|of France)| | | | |
| 1296 | 63-1/2 | 15 0 | 17 |2-110/127|
| 1309 | 63-1/2 | 14 0 | 16 |2-18/127 |
| 1324 | 64-1/2 | 15 0 | 17 |1-33/48 |
|(Meissen) | | | | |
| 1341 | 78 | 10 0 | 9 |2-6/13 |
| 1350 | 91 | 14 0 | 11 |2-14/91 |
| 1364 | 74-1/2 | 9 0 | 9 |0-36/149 |
| 1378 | 70 | 14 1 | 15 |1-1/14 |
| 1380 | 72 | 13 0 | 13 |2-1/6 |
| -- | 91 | 11 0 | 9 |0-24/91 |
|(Meissen) | | | | |
| 1390 | 85 | 10 0 | 8 |3-5/17 |
| -- | 90 | 9 0 | 7 |2 |
|(Meissen) | | | | |
| 1407 | 72-40/131| 8 0 | 8 |1-57/296 |
| 1412 | 82 | 4 0 | 3 |2-26/41 |
| 1444 | 88 | 7 13 | 6 |2-43/132 |
| -- | 160 | 16 0 | 7 |2 |
| 1459 | 101 | 5 9 | 4 |0-34/101 |
| 1470 | 100-20/307| 5 0 | 3 |2-507/512|
| 1490 | 103 | 5 0 | 3 |2-58/103 |
+----------+-----------+---------+----------+---------+
[Illustration: TABLE OF THE MOVEMENT OF GOLD & SILVER IN GERMANY
1300-1500.]
THE MOVEMENT OF GOLD IN GERMANY, 1300-1500, ILLUSTRATED BY THE MOVEMENT
OF THE GOLD GULDEN (RHEINISCHE GULDEN).
+-----------+------------+----------------+-----------------------------------+
| | Cologne | | Equivalent Value |
| | Mark | Alloy. | (as expressed in the |
| |coined into | | 20-Florin Standard). |
| Date. | | | |
| +------------+-------+--------+---------+-----------+-------------+
| | Pieces. |Carats.| Grains.| Florins.| Kreutzers.| Pfennige. |
+-----------+------------+-------+--------+---------+-----------+-------------+
| 1252 | 44-3/8 | 24 | 0 | 6 | 22 |3-405/2911 |
|(Florentine| | | | | | |
| Florin). | | | | | | |
| 1371 | 66 | 23 | 1 | 4 | 6 |2-434/781 |
| 1386 | 66 | 22 | 6 | 4 | 1 |1-85/781 |
| 1409 | 66 | 22 | 0 | 3 | 55 |3-517/781 |
| 1419 | 64-1/2 | 19 | 0 | 3 | 28 |1-2851/3053 |
| 1428 | 68 | 19 | 0 | 3 | 17 |3-18/1207 |
| 1442 | 72 | 19 | 0 | 3 | 6 |3-14/213 |
| 1477 | 69-1/3 | 18 | 10 | 3 | 3 |2-3104/15194 |
+-----------+------------+-------+--------+---------+-----------+-------------+
FRANCE.
In France during this same period the ratio of gold to silver was
changed in a single century more than a hundred and fifty times, and
with a roughness that is quite inconceivable to the modern mind. To take
a period of ten years for example:--
In 1303 the ratio was 10.26
" 1305 " 15.90
" 1308 " 14.46
" 1310 " 15.64
" 1311 " 19.55
" 1313 " 14.37
France presents the utmost difficulty to the student of metallic money
during this earliest period, by reason of these violent and arbitrary
alterations of the coinage. The extreme diversity of the coins, and the
perpetual changing of the composition or alloy, make it almost
impossible to estimate the fluctuations in the value of money in
relation to goods, or gold in relation to silver. Apart from the
international struggle for the precious metals, France was torn and
ruined by the English invasions, and debasement after debasement of the
coinage was resorted to as a means of raising money to continue the
struggle. Such debasements mark the reign of Philip le Bel, 1285-1314,
and of each succeeding king, from his days to the final ejection of the
English invaders, and after. A single instance will serve to show their
nature. In 1342 the mark of gold, which in a normal time just preceding
was valued at 41 livres 13 sols, was proclaimed equal to 117 livres, and
in 1360 the mark of silver, valued normally at 5 livres, rose to 102
livres.[5] It stands to reason that such abnormal movements must be
neglected in any attempt to determine the course of such fluctuations in
value of the metals, and the ratio of gold and silver, as arose
naturally from the metallic and currency history of the time.
Eliminating, therefore, this element of forced and accidental
debasements, due to political circumstance, the natural history, if it
may be so styled, of the French coinage displays the same tendency to
an appreciation of money metal which marks the history of the other
European countries.
[Illustration: TABLE OF THE MOVEMENT OF GOLD & SILVER IN FRANCE,
1300-1500.]
TABLE OF THE MOVEMENTS OF THE COINAGE OF FRANCE, 1300-1500.[6]
+----------+--------------------+-------------------------------+
| | The Mark of Silver | The Mark of Gold |
| | coined into | coined into |
| Date. | | |
| +-----------+--------+-----------+--------+----------+
| | Livres | Sols. | Livres | Sols. | Deniers. |
| |(Tournois).| |(Tournois).| | |
+----------+-----------+--------+-----------+--------+----------+
| 1309 | 2 | 19 | 44 | 0 | 0 |
| (Philp | | | | | |
| le Bel.)| | | | | |
| 1315 | 2 | 14 | 45 | 0 | 0 |
| 1343 | 3 | 4 | 43 | 6 | 8 |
| 1350 | 5 | 5 | 53 | 18 | 9 |
| 1361 | 5 | 0 | 60 | 0 | 0 |
| 1381 | 5 | 8 | 60 | 10 | 0 |
| 1422 | 7 | 0 | 76 | 5 | 0 |
| 1427 | 8 | 0 | 72 | 0 | 0 |
| 1429 | 7 | 0 | 77 | 10 | 0 |
| 1446 | 7 | 10 | 88 | 2 | 6 |
| 1456 | 8 | 10 | 100 | 0 | 0 |
| 1473 | 10 | 0 | 110 | 0 | 0 |
| 1475 | 10 | 0 | 118 | 10 | 0 |
+----------+-----------+--------+-----------+--------+----------+
In this table each of the points or dates taken marks a period of return
to good money after a period of debasement, and in the mind of the
legislator such return to good money (_monnaie forte_) can only be
construed as based on an estimated general or normal rate of monetary
values, for each particular succeeding point of time. At every return
to good money a proclamation was issued, expressing the determination of
the administration to adhere to good money, as in the halcyon days of
St. Louis, etc. etc., and fixing the rate at which the monies should be
coined and current. By taking these points or dates of return to good
money, therefore, we eliminate the arbitrary action of the Government in
periods of debasement, and arrive at a net result showing the _natural_
movement of the metals.
The general trend of the table--or of the metals whose movements it
portrays--is perceptible at a glance, and will, moreover, be found
exactly similar to that of the cases of England and Germany below. On
account of the arbitrary debasements by the Kings and of the numerous
feudal coinages struck independently by the bishops and subsidiary
lords, the question of the friction with which this process of metallic
appreciation worked itself out cannot be so well illustrated in the case
of France as in that of England. But so much as this may be briefly
indicated. In 1294 the scarcity of silver coinage was so great that a
proclamation was put forth ordering silver to be brought to the Mint,
and forbidding the export of the metals. In consequence of the futility
of this ordinance, a further proclamation was issued in 1309, forbidding
the circulation in France of English silver sterlings and gold florins
of Florence, and crying down the exchange denomination of all other
foreign coins. Similar proclamations were issued again and
again--notably in 1328. But the complaints as to the depletion of the
coin of the realm became much more serious in France after Edward III.
had instituted his gold coin in 1344. There was henceforth a process of
double friction--(1) as arising from the difference of the declared
value of the French King's coin, as compared with foreign tariffs of
coins; (2) as arising from the difference between the ratio of gold to
silver in France and that prevailing in other countries.
[Sidenote: ALTERATION IN SILVER RATE]
In 1336 Philippe de Valois had fixed the ratio at 1:12, "the cause which
moved us to this being that so our people who were in great privations
and straits for money may more abundantly and quickly be filled again
with money new and current." This was re-enacted in 1339, but proved
quite inoperative to rule the market rate, and in 1346 Philippe found
himself obliged to tolerate the advance which had been put upon the good
monies in the market, by allowing provisionally the _chaise d'or_ to be
current for 30 sols Tournois. Four years later the silver rate was
altered by a proclamation conceived in these terms: "As the changers and
merchants who are accustomed to bring bullion to our Mint have ceased,
and do daily cease to do so, so that the working of our Mint is greatly
impeded, to the great prejudice of our people if no remedy is applied,
we therefore order that for each mark of silver brought to the Mint
there shall be delivered out by the Mint another 8 sols Tournois in
addition to the 112 sols Tournois fixed by law." The immediate
consequence was a hoarding and disappearance of the gold coins, and in
the following year, 1351, the tale of the _denier d'or aux fleurs de
lis_ was altered from 50 to 54 to the mark.
There is here no question of an arbitrary debasement. It was simply an
attempt to preserve the currency from the action of a changing market
ratio, which led to the withdrawal now of the one, now of the other
coins, and to the circulation meanwhile of foreign coins at a rate
apparently disproportioned to the metallic content.[7] In 1361 evidence
was given before the Mint authorities that "in payments the people do by
abuse give foreign monies at a higher rate than they are worth, viz. the
_moutons_ of Flanders and Brabant at a higher rate than the _franc
d'or_, of which said _moutons_ the best specimens are worth 18 denars
less than the said _franc d'or_; a silver piece called _chartain_ for 16
and even 18 denars, which is worth no more than 10," and so on. Two
years later it was declared that the Mint at Tournay was on the point of
stopping work, "the people having been accustomed for a long time to
give a higher price for the mark of gold than in the case of other
monies of this kingdom, and this by reason of the foreign merchants."
Towards the close of his reign Charles V., finding his kingdom filled
with depreciated imported specie, while all the good native pieces had
been drawn out of the land, sought and obtained from the Pope, 1372, a
Bull of Excommunication against neighbour powers who should counterfeit
his monies. It was not until 1391 that the proper defensive measure of a
change of ratio was resorted to, and by that time the conditions of the
Mint rates in surrounding nations had so altered as to render the change
partially inoperative. In 1393, accordingly, there was a great lack of
the smaller silver coin, which led to a proclamation by Charles VI. on
the 2nd April of that year for encouraging the minting of _petiz deniers
Tournois_. The same complaint was, however, re-echoed in 1395 and 1396,
but, as it appears, quite futilely, for nine years after another
proclamation had to be issued against the currency of foreign coins of
Scotland, Navarre, the Rhenish and Netherland provinces, etc., "which
have course in our kingdom for a greater value than they are worth, by
which means our monies are arrested in their course and greatly
withdrawn; the gold and silver _deniers a l'ecu_ which we have minted
having been melted down."
[Sidenote: ACTION OF THE STATES-GENERAL IN 1420]
When the States-General met at Paris in 1420 the depreciated state of
the coinage was laid before the assembly as of prime concernment, and it
was by its advice that the proclamation of the following year was issued
fixing the _ecu d'or_ at a tale of 66 to the mark and of the _gros
d'argent_ at 86-1/4, "it being come to our knowledge that for some time
past the money in our kingdom is so diminished and enfeebled that by
this means the gold and silver which abounded is in very great measure
drawn away and transported, and the traffic of strangers here almost
ceased, and all necessaries of life put at a great height," etc. The
result of this reformation of 1421 was that during some portion of the
succeeding years of Charles VII.'s reign silver came from all parts in
great abundance, although in 1436 complaints were again heard that money
was not being coined and did not suffice for the public needs. At this
point, however, the complaints apparently ceased, and it was not till
twenty years later that the step was again taken of decrying and
forbidding the circulation of foreign specie.
The ceasing of the disorders in the French money is attributed to the
expulsion of the English invaders, but there can be little doubt that
much more simple and natural laws were at work. From the reign of Louis
XI. onwards these natural laws had freer play as against the disturbing
influence of mere arbitrary debasements, and it is easier to analyse
their influence.
[Sidenote: FRANCE IN 1488]
From his accession in 1461 onwards the monetary history of France
displays many analogies with that of the Netherlands (see Chapter II.).
Thus in 1470, finding the market rate of foreign coins driven above the
home Mint rate by the licence of the people (i.e. by normal market
action), Louis issued a tariff to regulate the exchange rate in which
the prevailing prices of the foreign specie were tolerated as an interim
for a period of three months. At the end of that time it was manifestly
impossible to secure a permanent reduction, and in order to prevent the
transport of specie it was found necessary, 4th January 1473, to raise
the value of the home coin both gold and silver (see account of French
monies in Appendix No. VI.). Still the export continued, and in 1475 the
process of enhancement had to be repeated as a measure of defence for
the gold specie. Thirteen years later similar precautions were taken for
the silver specie by Charles VIII.'s proclamation of 24th April 1488.
This is the last defensive measure of the first period of the monetary
history of France, and no further act is on record previous to the great
change in the relative values of the precious metals which ensued upon
the discovery of the New World.
THE RATIO BETWEEN GOLD AND SILVER IN EUROPE, 1300-1500.
+-----+------------------------+-------+--------+----------------+------+---------+-----+
|Date.| Italy. |France.|England.| Germany. |Spain.|Burgundy.|Date.|
| +---------+-------+------+ | +-----+----------+ | | |
| |Florence.|Venice.|Milan.| | | A. | B. | | | |
+-----+---------+-------+------+-------+--------+-----+----------+------+---------+-----+
|1252 | 10.75 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |1252 |
|1257 | .. | .. | .. | .. | 9.29 | .. | .. | .. | .. |1257 |
|1284 | .. | 10.84 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |1284 |
|1296 | 11.10 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |1296 |
|1303 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | 12.1 |1303 |
|1305 | 10.88 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |1305 |
|1308 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |1308 |
|1315 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |1315 |
|1324 | 13.62 | 13.99 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |1324 |
|1338 | .. | .. | .. | 12.61 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |1338 |
|1343 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |1343 |
|1344 | .. | .. | .. | .. | 12.59 | .. | .. | .. | .. |1344 |
|1344 | .. | .. | .. | .. | 11.04 | .. | .. | .. | .. |1344 |
|1345 | 11.04 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |1345 |
|1346 | .. | .. | .. | 11.11 | 11.57 |11.33| .. | .. | .. |1346 |
|1347 | 10.91 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |1347 |
|1348 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | 12.1 |1348 |
|1350 | .. | 14.44 |10.59 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |1350 |
|1351 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | 12.3 | .. | .. |1351 |
| | | | | | | | (Luebeck) | | | |
|1353 | .. | .. | .. | .. | 11.15 | .. | .. | .. | .. |1353 |
|1361 | .. | .. | .. | 12.0 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |1361 |
|1365 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |11.37| .. | .. | .. |1365 |
|1375 | 10.77 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | 12.4 | .. | .. |1375 |
| | | | | | | | (Luebeck) | | | |
|1379 | .. | 13.17 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |1379 |
|1380 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |1380 |
|1386 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | 10.76 | .. | .. |1386 |
| | | | | | | | (Rhine | | | |
| | | | | | | |Provinces)| | | |
|1391 | .. | .. | .. | 10.74 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |1391 |
|1399 | .. | 11.69 | .. | .. | .. | .. | 11.16 | .. | .. |1399 |
| | | | | | | | (Rhine | | | |
| | | | | | | |Provinces)| | | |
|1400 | .. | .. |11.630| .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |1400 |
|1402 | 10.58 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |1402 |
|1406 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | 10.66 | .. | .. |1406 |
| | | | | | | | (Rhine | | | |
| | | | | | | |Provinces)| | | |
|1411 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | 12.0 | .. | .. |1411 |
| | | | | | | | (Luebeck) | | | |
|1412 | .. | .. | .. | .. | 10.33 | .. | .. | .. | .. |1412 |
|1417 | .. | 12.56 | .. | 10.67 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |1417 |
|1421 | .. | .. | .. | 10.29 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |1421 |
|1422 | 10.16 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |1422 |
|1427 | .. | .. | .. | 9.00 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |1427 |
|1429 | .. | 11.04 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |1429 |
|1432 | .. | .. | .. | 10.87 | .. | .. | .. | 5.822| .. |1432 |
|1435 | .. | .. | .. | 12.32 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |1435 |
|1441 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |11.12| .. | .. | .. |1441 |
|1443 | .. | 12.1 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |1443 |
|1446 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |1446 |
|1447 | .. | .. | .. | 11.44 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |1447 |
|1450 | .. | .. |10.965| .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |1450 |
|1455 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | 12.2 | .. | .. |1455 |
| | | | | | | | (Luebeck) | | | |
|1456 | .. | .. | .. | 11.77 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |1456 |
|1460 | 9.33 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |1460 |
|1462 | 9.37 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |1462 |
|1464 | 11.42 | .. | .. | .. | 11.15 | .. | .. | 9.824| .. |1464 |
|1471 | 10.58 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |1471 |
|1472 | .. | 11.13 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |1472 |
|1474 | .. | 10.97 | .. | 11.00 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |1474 |
|1475 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |10.41 | .. |1475 |
|1480 | 10.83 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |10.87 | .. |1480 |
|1485 | 10.46 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |1485 |
|1486 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |10.98 | .. |1486 |
|1488 | .. | .. | .. | 11.83 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |1488 |
|1495 | 10.46 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |1495 |
|1497 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |10.01 | .. |1497 |
|1500 | .. | .. |10.975| .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |1500 |
|1506 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |10.262| .. |1506 |
+-----+---------+-------+------+-------+--------+-----+----------+------+---------+-----+
Germany--_A_, as determined by the purchase prices of the two metals in
the Luebeck Mint. _B_, as determined by the Mint ordinances.
[Sidenote: ENGLAND: COINAGE OF 1344]
England.
Even before the adoption of a gold coinage by Edward III., England had
felt the effect of loss by exchange, owing to the introduction of gold
florins by means of the Flemish trade. In the Parliament of 1339, at
Westminster, complaint was made of the want of coinage. It was proposed
as a remedy--(1) that every merchant should bring in 40s. or more for
every sack of wool that he should import, and (2) that it should be
considered by the King and his council whether it might not be
advantageous to permit _florins de ecu_ (of France), and florins of
Florence (i.e. gold), and other good florins to be current with the
_esterlings_ (i.e. the silver penny), "but only esterlings to be
compulsory for under 40s. value." In less than four years good money was
being carried out of the realm, and false money brought in at such a
rate that Parliament was seriously perplexed. In its debate on the
matter at Westminster, 1343, the result is thus stated: "All orders of
persons in the realm had loss for a long time, on account of the florins
which were delivered in payment in Flanders, bearing so high a value
there as to occasion a loss of one-third on all merchandise imported
thence." Certain goldsmiths of London were therefore ordered to be
called in to advise and to refine one or two of each kind of florin, so
as to rate the fine gold in them according to the true value. And it was
proposed that of this fine gold one kind of money should be made in
England and Flanders, provided the Flemings were willing, to be current
in both countries at such an alloy and value as should be determined by
the King and Council, and all other gold money to be taken at bullion
value, and all silver money to be reckoned thereby ("other sufficient
money to be received according to the value of the fine gold").
The result was the first practical issue of English gold. In 1344 an
indenture was made between the King on the one part and George Kirkyn
and Lotte Nicholyn of Florence, goldmasters and workers, on the other,
for the coining of three monies of gold, one to be current at 6s., and
to be equal in weight to 2 _petits florins_ of Florence of good weight,
50 of these being coined out of the pound Tower of London.
In this indenture Edward copied the ratio prevailing in the French
kingdom, viz. that of 12.61 to 1 between gold and silver. That ratio was
considerably too high, and he quickly experienced the same effects which
were felt by the French King from it. During his reign (1327-50) Philip
of Valois coined more species of new money than all his predecessors put
together, but owing to the adoption of this too high a ratio the country
was gradually depleted of good money. In order to induce people to bring
bullion to the Mint he offered to coin free of cost, but found nothing
of avail until he followed the example of England and altered the ratio.
In our own country the same truth had been quickly grasped. It was found
that the new gold money was rated too high, i.e. overvalued in relation
to silver, and was therefore refused. By a proclamation of the same
year, therefore, 9th July, it was withdrawn and ordered to be taken only
as bullion, and a new indenture was made for the coining of gold
nobles--39-1/2 out of the pound Tower, and at the value of 6s. 8d. The
nobles were at once made current and tenderable along with silver, by
proclamation; gold being ordered to be received in payment of 20s. and
upwards.
[Sidenote: GOLD NOBLES COINED]
By this indenture the ratio was at once dropped from 12.59:1 to 11.04:1.
This attempt to determine the rate of exchange is a common feature in
the legislation of France and Spain as well as of England. It stands to
sense, and is apparent on every page of the monetary history of the
period, that it was absolutely imperative. The friction which
accompanied the process can now only faintly be imagined, but that is a
secondary consideration. The essential point was, that such changes were
normal and inevitable, forced by sheer necessity upon Governments, such
an one even as our own, which has always been most jealously
conservative in matters of coinage.
TABLE OF THE VARIATIONS OF THE GOLD AND SILVER COINS OF ENGLAND,
1300-1500.
+----------------------+---------------------------------------------------+
| Silver. | Gold. |
+-------+--------------+-------+--------+----------+-----------+-----------+
| | Weight of | | | Weight | | Price in |
| Date. | the Silver | Date. | Coin. | in | Value | Pence per |
| | Penny in | | | Grains. | Declared.| Grain of |
| | Troy Grains. | | | | | Gold. |
+-------+--------------+-------+--------+----------+-----------+-----------+
| | | | | | _s._ _d._ | |
| 1300 | 22 | 1344 | Florin | 108 | 6 0 | 0.6666 |
| 1344 | 20-1/4 | 1344 | Noble | 138-6/13 | 6 8 | 0.5777 |
| 1346 | 20 | 1346 | ... | 128-4/7 | 6 8 | 0.6222 |
| 1351 | 18 | 1353 | ... | 120 | 6 8 | 0.6666 |
| 1412 | 15 | 1414 | ... | 108 | 6 8 | 0.7407 |
| 1464 | 12 | 1460 | ... | 120 | 8 4 | 0.7500 |
| | | 1470 | Angel | 80 | 6 8 | 1.0000 |
+-------+--------------+-------+--------+----------+-----------+-----------+
In the first issue of Edward III. the Troy grain of gold had been valued
at .6666 of a penny. At such rate it was overvalued and refused, and in
the second issue of the same year the value was dropped to .5777 of a
penny. Gradually, as the ratio on the Continent changed, and came to
bear on the English rate, this was in its turn found an under-valuation,
and only two years later, 1346, the value was raised to .6222, making a
ratio of 11.57 to 1. The change was made in consequence of loud and
serious complaints of the scarcity of coin, good money being carried out
and false "Lusshebournes" (Luxembourgs), worth only 8s. in the pound,
being brought in. The grievance was so great that Parliament petitioned
Edward most urgently to interfere, instancing in special the Lombards,
"that they purchased English florins at a lower rate than that which was
appointed," and praying "that such persons should not buy or sell the
said money, nor make any agreement, in the sale of their merchandise,
what money they would receive in rejection of English money." To this it
was answered, that it should be commanded throughout England that all
persons should receive for their merchandise gold, according to the
currency ordained, without any agreement to be made, under pain of
imprisonment and heavy ransom, and when any agreement had been made it
should be at the will of the purchaser to pay money of gold or silver as
he should think fit. At the same time, an ordinance was issued
forbidding any person to carry out the King's good money or to bring in
counterfeit.
[Sidenote: EDWARD III.'S CHANGES OF RATIO]
[Illustration: TABLE OF THE MOVEMENT OF GOLD & SILVER IN ENGLAND
1300-1500.]
The effect of Edward's change of ratio--from 12.59 (the same as the
French rate) in 1344 to 11.04 in 1346--told immediately on the French
currency, and at the first return to good money in the first year of
King John (1350-64) the ratio in that country was changed at a stroke
from 12.61 to 11.11. This in its turn acted upon precious metals in
England, and for three years the English King found himself futilely
struggling against an outflow of silver, by such measures as the hanging
and drawing of merchants, before he discovered that it was due to an
overvaluation of gold. In 1353, accordingly, he lowered the weight of
the gold nobles from 128-4/7 grs. to 120. At the same time, the contents
of the silver penny were reduced in a greater proportion (from 20 grs.
to 18). By this means the ratio of 11.04, which had prevailed since
1346, was lowered to 11.15.
That this ratio achieved its purpose, as far as England was concerned,
is apparent from the simple fact that it remained unaltered for over
sixty years until 1414; that it acted adversely upon and drained France
of her gold is apparent from the change of the ratio there at her first
immediately succeeding return to good money. Two periods of debasement
had marked the short reign of John of France (1350-64), and the effect
of these and of the influence of the English ratio was such that in 1360
there was no gold in his kingdom. Towards the end of that year, and in
the beginning of 1361, John promulgated a reformation of the coinage--a
return to good or "forte" money, and in this reformation he adopted a
ratio which would act on the English stock of precious metals.
In England, Edward's action in 1353 in lowering the contents of both
silver and gold coins, and altering the ratio, had given rise to great
discontent, to an extent which proved how wiser and truer to the
nation's interest was the King than his people. This diminution of the
value of these coins, says the Chronicle, made all things dearer, so
that the workmen and servants became assuming and demanded greater
wages.
There is as little foundation for such an innuendo as there is for the
view which regards this depreciation as an issue of base money. It was
simply a measure of precaution, as stopping an invisible and insidious
outflow of the currency.
[Sidenote: ENGLAND AND FRANCE IN 1360]
Looked at historically, and not at all controversially, such results as
have been just described can only be attributed to the European monetary
system of the time. Apart altogether from the arbitrary debasement of
the coin, as, e.g., in France--apart even from changes of the ratio
enacted with the mere crafty design of inducing a flow of gold, the
monetary system of the time was so rough, so unscientific; the tariffing
of the coins of different nations against each other was so inexact, so
much a matter of rule-of-thumb, of hasty average, that it was simply
impossible to issue such general tables of equivalents of coins and such
a ratio as would have given stability to the various coinages of Europe.
If the currency system of England had been of silver alone, a single
enactment lessening the content of the unit coin, or crying up its
denomination, would have stopped any outflow caused by under-valuation
as compared with foreign money value. The same if it had been only gold.
But being combined of the two, being, as it was, both gold and silver,
it was necessary, in the case of such outflow, not merely to call down
one or both of them below the value of foreign gold or silver, but also
and at the same time to establish such a ratio between the two metals
for _internal_ circulation as would give no advantage to exchangers
acquainted with a different ratio prevailing in some particular part of
the Continent. And just the same for the other European money systems.
If, for instance, the English sterling had been called down to a value
which would of itself have forbidden export to the Continent, but at the
same time such a ratio had been left standing between these sterlings
and the gold nobles (say 12:1) as was so far in excess of the ratio
prevailing in some parts of Europe (say 11:1) as to overlap the amount
by which the sterling had been called down, then the result could, and
doubtless would, be an outflow of silver, in face and spite of the
apparent higher tariff of the English sterling, as against the
continental silver coins. This is the historic, patent, undeniable
defect and weakness in the bimetallic system of the Europe of that day.
It must be borne well in mind how different the problem then was from
that which now besets the monetary world. To-day the flow of the
precious metals is natural, the indicator, facilitator, and safety-valve
of international trade. Such a conception was an utter impossibility to
the fourteenth century. The rulers of that age had only one idea, the
maintenance or increase of the treasure of the realm, first for military
purposes, and then for trade; and their mental horizon was limited by
the boundaries of each their little dominion. They could not grasp the
idea of Europe as a monetary whole, each fought for his own head or
land, and each found a ready weapon to hand in the monetary confusion of
the time. In any system so rough and so non-uniform as that of Europe in
the fourteenth century, any variation of one metal served as a
vantage-point against the other, as a lever to press upon and force it
out. One metal would have been safe (so long as no partial depreciation
was allowed), two metals served simply as fulcra to each other's
oscillations, to the undoing of both. The mediaeval legislator could not
grasp that there was a double train of principle and event transacting
itself under his very eyes--the one, changes of denomination of coins;
the other, changes of ratio. In less than thirty years after Edward III.
had cried down the English coins to below the competing denominations of
the Continent, the changes of the European ratio had produced their
effect, and Richard II. found the realm denuded of its treasure and
currency.
[Sidenote: ENGLAND IN 1378]
From 1360 the ratio on the Continent gradually sank from 12:1 till
towards the end of the first quarter of the fifteenth century, when it
stood in France as low as 9:1.
That France experienced the process, which must have been perfectly
natural and due simply to relatively diminishing production of silver in
those years, 1360-1425, is seen in her alteration of the ratio from 12
to 10.74 in 1380 and to 10.29 in 1422.
In England the same train of events made itself felt at almost the same
moment. In 1378 great complaints were made of the export of gold and
silver, and of the enfeebled state of the money which remained in the
realm, "so that if a remedy be not speedily applied, the King will
receive no more than 4s. where he should receive 5s."
[Sidenote: THE MONETARY INQUIRY OF 1381]
Three years later--one year after the French King had lowered his ratio
from 12.1 to 10.74--the Commons presented a petition to the King during
the sitting of Parliament, 1381, complaining of the wretched want of the
kingdom, which was devoid of treasure, monies of gold and silver being
carried out of the realm, and those remaining being clipped to one-third
their nominal value. No money at all was being minted in the Tower, and
a heavy export of our metals to Scotland and Ireland was taking place.
Simultaneously the officers of the Mint presented a petition to the King
and his Council in Parliament, complaining that no money was being
coined. The causes of this, in their opinion, were--
1. That the monies of gold and silver beyond the seas were more feeble
than the monies of England, on which account the merchants could not
bring bullion into England for their profit nor for the King's
advantage. But if any manner of bullion of gold were brought into the
kingdom, by persons travelling, it was sold to those who conveyed it out
of England, to their great gain and to the injury of the whole realm.
2. That the silver of England which [i.e. when it] was found to be good
and heavy, was taken into Scotland, because the money of that country
was so light.
3. That the gold of England being so good and heavy, and that beyond sea
so light, the _nobles_ which came from Calais were gone into Flanders,
and the English _nobles_ were carried beyond the sea, to the great
profit of those who exported them, etc. etc.
4. That the money of gold and silver of England was commonly clipped, so
that they who thought they should have L100 would have no more than L90,
unless a remedy were speedily applied.
The officers of the Mint were accordingly ordered to be called before
the Lords of the Parliament for examination, and they were succeeded by
others, private persons but mostly goldsmiths, who were called upon as
experts. In the case of these latter the various statements of opinion
are preserved for us in the Rolls of Parliament, and they possess a
peculiar interest.
Richard Leye thought that the reason why no gold or silver was brought
into England, but, on the contrary, that which had been in the kingdom
was exported, was this, that the realm expended too much on merchandise,
such as grocery, mercery, furs, etc. He therefore proposed that every
merchant who imported goods into England should export an equal quantity
of the produce of the realm, and that no one should take out gold or
silver, contrary to the statutes.
As to the gold not agreeing with the silver (which was Article IV. of
the inquiry), he thought that could not be remedied, unless the money
were changed, and to change it in any manner would be productive of
universal injury to Lords, Commons, etc.
To Article V. he advised that, whereas new money had been made in
Flanders and in Scotland, proclamation be made that all manner of coins
of Flanders, Scotland, and of all other places beyond the seas, should
be no longer current in England, and that no one should receive them in
payment except as bullion to be carried to the King's Mint.
Lincoln, a goldsmith, gave his opinion similarly against the permission
to export gold and silver, and proposed that the gold noble should
remain of the same weight as it had been, but at a greater value.
To the First Article Cranten said, that no more in value of foreign
merchandise should be consumed within the realm than should be exported
of commodities, the growth of England; and then, whether the money were
enhanced or debased, it would hereafter remain within the realm. Also,
that exchanges or other payments by letters should not be made out of
Flanders, or other parts beyond the seas, to pay in England for any
merchandise.
John Hoo advised a proclamation against the carrying out of gold or
silver, and that the money should be received by weight.
The statement of opinion of the succeeding and last witness is extremely
valuable and interesting. Richard Aylesbury opined that, provided the
merchandise exported from England was properly regulated,--that is, if
no more of foreign commodities were allowed to be imported than the
value of the native products which should be taken out,--the money then
in England would remain, and great plenty would come from beyond the
seas.
He also conceived it to be expedient that the Pope's collector [of
Peter's Pence] should be an Englishman, and that the Pope's money
should be sent to him in merchandise and not in coin, and that the
journeys of clerks should be entirely forbidden, on pain, etc.
For the feebleness of the gold, which was occasioned by clipping, he
conceived there was no other remedy but that it should be universally
weighed by those who received it, and that the proclamation should be
made accordingly.
_The agreement of the gold with the silver he believed could not be
effected unless the money were changed, but that he dared not to propose
on account of the general damage which would ensue._
On account of the new money which had been made in Flanders and
Scotland, he advised that all Scottish monies should be forbidden by
proclamation, and also all other monies from beyond the sea, so that
they should have no currency in England; and that no one should take
them in payment, except at their value as bullion and for the King's
coinage; that no one should export gold or silver, according to the
statute in that case made, etc.
And, further, he suggested, by way of information, that the pound of
gold which was there made into the sum of 45 nobles (but which pound, by
reason of clipping and otherwise impairing, was then valued at 41-1/2
nobles) should be made into 48 nobles, to be current at the same value
as before.
This last proposition would have reduced the ratio to a fraction over
11:1--something higher than the ratio prevalent in France. Instead of
acting on evidence such as this, however, and so changing the ratio,
Richard's Government contented itself with the perfectly useless
prohibition of export of gold or silver (statute 5 Rich. II. cap. 1).
Four years later, accordingly, the matter was again pressed upon the
attention of Parliament, and even by the Chancellor of the realm,
Michael de la Pole himself, in his opening speech. The English money, he
said, was in greater estimation and of higher value in all other places
than in England. It was therefore sought out and craftily withdrawn, and
the chief or greatest remedy was to increase the value or price of the
said money.
In spite of such recommendation as this the measure was not adopted, and
Richard fell back on his previous expedients, crying down by
proclamation the value of the Scotch coins, 1387, and of the gold coins
of Flanders and Brabant, 1393, and ordaining by enactment that exporters
of goods should bring in 1 oz. of gold for every sack of wool which they
sold.
Such an ordinance as this last is of the commonest and most frequent
occurrence in the enactments of fifteenth-century England, but always
unworkable as warring against the most elementary principles of
international trade.
On his accession, therefore, Henry IV. found himself heir to an
accumulation of monetary evil, through the impolicy and want of courage
of Richard.
[Sidenote: THE RECOINAGE OF 1414]
He was obliged, at the request of the mayors and merchants of the staple
of Calais, to abolish the last unworkable ordinance just referred to,
and attempted at the same time to provide a positive remedy by reviving
a proclamation against the currency of silver halfpennies brought from
Venice, of which three or four only were equal to one sterling in value.
In 1401 the Commons complained in Parliament that nobles of Flanders
were so common in England that a man could not receive a sum of 100
shillings without taking three or four such nobles, each of them more
feeble than the English noble by two-pence.
A statute was accordingly passed, enacting that all money of gold and
silver of the coin of Flanders and all other lands, and of Scotland,
should be voided out of the land, or put to coin to the bullion.
It was all in vain. Two years later, 1403, the Commons again complained
of the depletion of gold, and again a statute was passed, and so on.
This futile process actually reproduces itself yearly up to 1411, when
at last the question of a recoinage was fairly faced. By the ordinance
for, and regulation of, the money of the realm, of that year, it was
provided that, "because of the great scarcity of money at the time," the
Master of the Mint should make of every pound of gold 50 nobles, and of
silver 30 shillings of esterlings of old alloy.
This recoinage was carried out and finished in the third year of Henry
V., 1414. Under it the contents of the silver penny sank from 18 to 15
grs., and of the gold noble from 120 to 108 grs., the consequent change
in the ratio being from 11.15, which had prevailed since 1353 to 10.33.
At this latter rate the monetary system of England remained for almost
fifty years, viz. up to 1460. But, though the rate endured so long, it
is not for a moment to be supposed that the ensuing period was one of
repose. Within eight years of the accomplishment of the reform in the
English coinage, the ratio in France was lowered to a point somewhat
below the established rate in England, and with considerable variation
remained lower through all the years in question, 1414-1460. In 1421 it
was changed to 10.29, in 1427 to 9, in 1432 to 10.87, and in 1447 to
11.44.
The effect on England, as recorded in the complaints in Parliament, was
almost parallel with that in the days of Richard. In 1414 complaints
were made against the circulation of galley halfpence by the merchants
of Venice. Three years later proclamation was made against the
circulation of the gold monies of Flanders, called _Burgundy nobles_,
which were of less value than the English nobles. In 1419 it was found
that money was being exported "more largely, and in many other manners,
than had been accustomed, to the great mischief and impoverishment of
the whole realm." And in the following year the usual statute was
enacted, on the petition of the Commons, commanding foreign money to be
taken as bullion. Again, two years later, 1422, the enfeebled and
depreciated state of the coinage was so apparent that the collectors of
the subsidy granted in that year by Parliament were instructed to accept
nobles as of the denominational value of 6s. 8d. (i.e. the full value),
"provided they stretched verily to the value of 5s. 8d. by weight." At
the same time silver money was so scarce that "though [i.e. even if] a
noble were so good of gold and weight as 6s. 8d., yet men could get no
white money for it." In 1423 the Commons complained of the want of
silver coins in the realm, "to the great unease and harm of the poorer
people of this land," "because [says the statute, which was accordingly
enacted], that silver is bought and sold uncoined at 32s. the pound of
Troy, whereas the same pound is no more of value at the coin than 32s.,
with an abatement of 12 dens. for the coinage."
[Sidenote: THE MONETARY TROUBLES OF HENRY VI]
From the twenty-fourth chapter of the statute of 1429 it appears, quite
consonantly, "that the merchant aliens had of late introduced a custom
of refusing to take silver, as they were wont, for their merchandises,
and of taking only gold nobles, half-nobles, and farthings, which, from
time to time, they carried out of the realm into other foreign
countries, where they were changed to their increase and forged into
other coins, so that they gained in the alloy of every noble twenty
pence, against the tenor of the statutes, etc., and to the prejudice of
the King and realm. Therefore the King, willing to provide a remedy,
ordained that no merchant alien should constrain nor bind any of his
liege people by promise covenant or liege, to make him payment in gold
for any manner of debt due to him, nor refuse to receive payment in
silver for any manner of such duty or debt, upon the pain of the double
value of the same."
In 1439 provision was again ordered to prevent exportation of money by
merchant aliens. It was renewed in 1448, and five years later the
Commons petitioned that the silver mines of Devon and Cornwall, which
had not been worked for a long time, might be again opened, on account
of the great scarcity of money.
The confusion of the Wars of the Roses, however, renders it slightly
problematical how far the two successive lowerings of the coinage, which
took place in 1460 and 1465 or 1470, are to be attributed to arbitrary
action or to a natural process. By the recoinage of 1460 the noble was
increased in weight from 108 grs. to 120 grs., and the value from 6s.
8d. to 8s. 4d., being a real appreciation of the grain of gold from
.7407 to .7500 of a penny. At approximately the same date, 1464, the
weight of the silver penny was lowered from 15 to 12 grs. In the
succeeding recoinage of 1465 and 1470 these rates were again altered. A
new gold coin, the _angel_, was instituted, weighing 80 grs., and valued
at 6s. 8d., while the weight of the silver penny was left unaltered. The
ratio was accordingly changed to 11.15.
This was the last change of the coinage made in England before the era
of the discovery of America. The internal effects which the changes had
on the commerce of the time are hidden from us by the disturbing
influences of the Wars of the Roses.
[Sidenote: CONCLUSION OF THE FIRST PERIOD]
But it is, probably, in connection with this change of the English
ratio--or with some wider, general movement, acting on both countries
alike--that the last monetary ordinances of Louis XI. of France,
referred to above, are to be understood.
These acts of conflicting policies mark the conclusion of the first
period of European metallic monetary history, for no further changes
were enacted previous to the close of the century and the discovery of
America. As far as England was concerned, the monetary system remained
comparatively unchanged till the days of Henry VII.
On a review of the whole period two simple facts emerge with
unmistakable plainness and import.
1. It was a period in which the commercial expanse outstripped the
reinforcing supply of the precious metals, and therefore in which a real
decline of prices[8] prevails.
2. The evil effects of such decline were enormously increased by
shortsighted, crafty manipulation of the currency by the European
rulers, and by the rough, unscientific system of the prevailing coinage
and exchange rates, and by the inability of the age to understand, or
even to perceive, the hidden working of two metals see-sawing against
each other--acting as levers against each other--cutting each other's
throats. The discovery of America corrected the fall of prices and saved
Europe, but it left her rulers as deadly ignorant as before of the
workings of bimetallism--to give a name to what they had not even
perceived as a phenomenon, much less as a system.
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 1: This is the date accepted by the numismatic authorities. It
is adopted by Orsini (_Storia delle Monete della Repubblica Fiorentina_,
p. xxiv, where he states the authority for it). It is nevertheless open
to serious doubt. See in De Saulcy, Documents I. pp. 115-131, references
to florins d'or from 1180 onwards. On the other hand, as to the nature
of the florin de compte and its distinction from the florin d'or, see
M.L. Blancard, _Revue numismatique_, 1886, pp. 48, 218, and 1887, p.
259; and Vicomte D'Avenel, _Histoire de la propriete, etc._, i. p. 41.]
[Footnote 2: Est a notter que le Roi en fit forger aulcune quantite
(some slight quantity) d'or du poids de 12 den. 16 gr. chacune piece
laguelle auvrage il dedia seullement pour sou aulmosne aux pauvres
ausquels souvent il lavait les piedz par humilite. Et en fut jamais
inventee ladite piece d'or pour aultre cause que dessus et non pour
monnaie uzuelle et publicque." (De Saulcy, _Documents, i._ 115, 122,
125).]
[Footnote 3: See, however, in De Saulcy, i. 31, a mention of _manteletz
d'or de Flandre_ in 1265.]
[Footnote 4: Soetbeer considers the standard in 1386 as 23 fine, and
asserts that, by the Mint edict of 1402, it was lowered to 22-1/2
carats.]
[Footnote 5: For an estimation of the _commercial_ effect of these
debasements, see Vicomte D'Avenel, _Histoire de la propriete, etc._, i.
53-54]
[Footnote 6: For a similar table calculated in francs, see Vicomte
D'Avenel, _Histoire de la propriete, etc._, i. 62, 481, where the
figures are very different. On Le Vicomte D'Avenel's method of
calculation, see the _English Historical Review_.]
[Footnote 7: See note on p. 397, infra..]
[Footnote 8: By prices here, and subsequently throughout this volume, is
meant the price or tariff and Mint rate of the coins. There is no
reference whatever to general prices.]