Very interesting. Just came across this paper "The origins of money: Calculation of similarity indexes demonstrates the earliest development of commodity money in prehistoric Central Europe" which proposes that 5,000 years ago, in Central Europe, rings, bangles and axe blades, standardized by shape and weight, were used as an early form of money...
The same goes for bronze axes, which although had practical value, were also status symbols and could have been used as a value token, which could be exchanged for other goods...Basically money...Over 250 bronze axes, found in a pot, most virtually identical in terms of weight.
Of course this can all be explained in another way...The axes are the same weight and size because that is functionally the best weight and size for an average Joe Bronze Age guy...Most axe heads made today are also very much standard in size...For the same reason...
The general rule is that there's three sizes of standard axes. Handaxe / hatchet (usually about 1.25-1.5lb). Boy's axe / house axe (usually 2-3lb). Felling axe (usually 3.5-6lb)...
Maybe the 250 axe heads were stored together in a pot by the guy who made them...Hidden "until this shit blows over"...I wrote about similar hoard found all over Balkans and date to the time of the Bronze Age collapse in this post...
Maybe torcs are all the same (actually very similar) size and weight because human necks are also very similar...And so is the amount of bling a Bronze Age Joe and Jane Blogs would feel comfortable carrying around said necks of theirs...
Maybe the bronze ribs were all standard in size because they were used for making something standard in size...I have no idea what, but that is not really the point...We can explain the existence of all these identical objects in other ways, and just as money...
The best bit is that just because axe head is standard size because it is practically the best size for an axe head, doesn't mean that it wasn't also used as money...These two things are not mutually exclusive...
In fact, the manufacture of many identical (for practical reasons) highly sought after objects would naturally turn them into money...Well valuable barter exchange tokens...Which is what money is...
Not sure if you have seen this, though it is not new:
ReplyDeletehttp://maajournal.com/Issues/2017/Vol17-1/Sweatman%20and%20Tsikritsis%2017%281%29.pdf
Astrological symbols from the younger dryas era.
I think the oldest crafted 'monetary'. tokens were identical ostrich eggshell beads, exchanged for the right (via "adopted" family association) to access water during drought, possibly a single bead allowing a single filling of one eggshell of water. This may go back 70,000 years in parts of Africa and later in the Middle-East, and eventually in China.
ReplyDeleteHum... think about North American Native and European settler trades. The items traded had specific utility, but were traded in sufficient quantity to have set values. So both money and merchandise. Cheers,
ReplyDeleteGuy
You have to be careful about barter. If I trade you skins for axe heads, and then I use the axe heads to cut down trees, then the axe heads weren't money - it was a straight, moneyless stuff-for-stuff deal. The question might be, once I accept axe heads from you in exchange for my skins, will you accept them back and give me linen cloth, or a calf? Said in another way, if I give you a pig in exchange for your daughter, is the girl money? Although the line blurs between barter and buying with money, there is a difference even if one item is standardized.
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