Page 217 Though Roman Government had endeavored to monopolize all sources of the material of its tangible currency and had prevented as much as possible the circulation of precious metal which clearly would undermine the integrity of the state issued unit of exchange, the grandiose aes, it still could not prevent counterfeits from entering circulation. It could not prevent the corrupt practices of oriental banking after the extensive re-entry of silver into circulation as a result of concessions made to the international bullion traders during the 2nd Punic War, nor thereafter, the functioning of Greshams Law Šwhich such entailed. Bad money drives out the good which of course, depends on what is bad and what is good! Nor, therefore, could it control the activities of that underground that garnered the precious metal from the circulation of more profitable use elsewhere. As a consequence of the rejection by growing and powerful states of the claim of silver bullion interests that all tangible money should be founded on their product as base and common denominator of values and the creation and paying into circulation of their own tangible money, with value deriving from its scarcity or otherwise, using copper or bronze as the material on which its numbers were recorded, much copper or bronze that came the way of the international bullion brokers would have been used in an extensive industry devoted to counterfeiting of these fiduciary currencies.
Posted on: Sat, 24 Jan 2015 22:38:08 +0000
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