Dear jayrusalem-ga
The relative value of gold and silver coinage would very much depend
on how pure the coinage was. Also, who was responsible for issuing the
coinage. As you can appreciate, ?biblical times? cover several
centuries and places, so I have concentrated on Judea. To confuse
things further, during biblical times Judea was invaded and governed
by many other empires - each produced their own coinage.
The International Standard Bible Encyclopedia tells us that
"There were no coins in use in Palestine until after the Captivity. It
is not quite certain whether gold and silver were before that time
divided into pieces of a certain weight for use as money or not, but
there can be no question of coinage proper until the Persian
period...(...)...The Jews had no native coins until the time of the
Maccabees, who struck coins after gaining their independence about
143-141 BC. These kings struck silver and copper, or the latter, at
least, in denominations of shekels and fractions of the shekel, until
the dynasty was overthrown by the Romans...(...)...The coins of the
Herods and the Procurators are abundant, but all of copper, since the
Romans did not allow the Jewish rulers to strike either silver or gold
coins."
During the revolts, silver and copper coins were minted and when Judea
became a Roman colony coins were minted by the Romans.
Source
http://www.searchgodsword.org/enc/isb/view.cgi?number=T2189
This site has some useful biblical references to money ?
"The common coin of the New Testament was the Roman Denarii and the
Greek Drachma and Tetradrachm. The Jews did have a coin called the
Lepton but it was rare. Mark 12:42 Jewish coinage was not produced on
a large scale until after 66 A.D. There were three forms of coinage
during the New Testament time. There were Roman, Greek and Jewish
coinage which made commerce very confusing."
"Denarius
This was the common Roman coin in Jesus day. It was made of silver and
worth about .16 cents. The workers in the vineyard each received a
Denarius for their days wage. Matthew 20:2-13 The good Samaritan paid
the Inn Keeper two denarii for looking after the wounded man. Luke
10:35It was the Denarius which Jesus requested when he was asked if it
was right to pay taxes to Caesar. Mark 12:15."
Source
http://www.abu.nb.ca/ecm/topics/custom6.htm
The Romans in BC24 standardized their coinage and this included gold
coins. The table was prepared for Roman Britain, but the relationship
of the values would have been similar for Judea. So from this you can
see that 1 gold aureus equalled 25 silver denarius (If the table have
not formatted properly, please refer to the web site.)
aureus denarius sestertius dupondius as semis quadrans
(gold) (silver) (brass) (brass) (copper) (brass) (copper)
1 25 100 200 400 800 1600
1 4 8 16 32 64
1 2 4 8 16
1 2 4 8
1 2 4
1 2
Source
http://www.roman-britain.org/coinage.htm
Similar figures are quoted here -
Roman Currency
Aureus (gold) = 25 denarii
Denarius (silver) = 1 day's wage; 4 sesterii
Sestertius (brass) = 2 dupondii; ¼ denarius
Dupondius = 2 asses
Assarius (copper) = 4 kodrantes
Source
http://www.duke.edu/~kimd/ref/currency.html
Click on the links below and you will see the vast array of the
different coins of Judea?s history
Ancient Jewish Coins
http://members.aol.com/FLJOSEPHUS/coins.htm
Minting in the Land of Israel ? Israel Museum
http://www.imj.org.il/eng/archaeology/numismatics/minting.html
Ancient prices and monetary systems of Greece, Persia and Roman Empire.
http://www.gold-eagle.com/editorials_00/mbutler031900.html
Jewish coins
http://www.calgarycoin.com/reference/jewish/anjew.htm
I hope this answers your question. If it does not, or the answer is
unclear, then please ask for clarification of this research before
rating the answer. I shall respond to the clarification request as
soon as I receive it.
Thank you
answerfinder
"roman coinage" judea
://www.google.com/search?hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&q=%22roman+coinage%22+judea
gold silver coins "shekel"
://www.google.com/search?q=gold+silver+coins+%22shekel%22&hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8
gold silver coins "jerusalem"
://www.google.com/search?q=gold+silver+coins+%22jerusalem%22&hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8
gold silver value "ancient times"
://www.google.com/search?hl=en&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&q=gold+silver+value+%22ancient+times%22 |
Request for Answer Clarification by
jayrusalem-ga
on
19 Dec 2003 01:32 PST
Hi -- that was a thorough, solid answer for Judean times, though I
guess I could have been a drop clearer. I was hoping for closer to the
times of King David (about 1,000 BC), though if your answer is that
there simply weren't coins back then, then I guess that's it. My only
question is then how they traded -- if they used metals at all, or if
the simply traded goods...which would have been complicated for tax
collecting, which began around the time of David/Solomon...
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Clarification of Answer by
answerfinder-ga
on
19 Dec 2003 05:09 PST
Dear jayrusalem-ga,
Thank you for your clarification and narrowing down of the time frame.
I?m sorry my answer was not that clear but I was trying to cover a
long period of history.
Coins did not exist at the time of David. Gold, Silver and Copper or
Brass would have been smelted into specific weights but it would
appear that archeologists have not yet identified the relative value
to each other as you find in a monetary system using coins.
According to the site I referred you to
"true monetary systems did not exist until the development of coinage c.700BC"
Before then reference was made to a specific weights of metal.
http://www.gold-eagle.com/editorials_00/mbutler031900.html
The International Standard Bible Encyclopedia confirms that there was
no coinage at the time of David .
"dar'-ik
A Persian gold coin about a guinea or five dollars in value. The first
form of the word occurs in 1 Chronicles 29:7; Ezra 2:69, and Nehemiah
7:70-72; the second in Ezra 8:27 and is rendered, "dram" in the King
James Version and "daric" in the Revised Version (British and
American). In the passage in Chronicles, it must refer to a weight,
since at the time of David there were no coins, but in the days of
Ezra and Nehemiah the Persian darics were current."
http://www.searchgodsword.org/enc/isb/view.cgi?number=T2530
"Before the minting of coins, careful weights of precious metals were
used as a means of exchange, with the shekel and talent of the Bible a
frequent as units of measure. Many weights in these measures have been
found in Israel."
http://members.aol.com/FLJOSEPHUS/coins.htm
This article on the history of money may be of interest as its early
paragraphs deal with reference to gold and silver in the Bible.
http://www.mintmark.com/moneyhistory.html
I hope this clarifies the answer for you.
answerfinder-ga
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