ED GLAESER: I hate to sort of start of as an economist, as a dismal scientist.
But it's somewhat embarrassing to admit that the thing that economists really love
about old coins is that they are a memory, a history of the trade that took place in
the past, where gold coins from Byzantium show up in Yorkshire or
tells us that there were traders who were going all across these lands, tell us what
these coins teach us about the history of the cities of the past, tell us about what
we learn from this room. PHOEBE SEGAL: Thank you for
having me, that's a wonderful question and
I beleive that the layout of the gallery in fact with all of our best Greek coins
in the center, in the center two cases behind you laid out by city state,
demonstrates how much the city state is embedded in the history of coins.
Each city had its own set of denominations, so
the value of the metal, gold, silver, electrum, bronze,
combined with the coins weight, and each city has its own standard.
So when cities traded with one another, in fact they had to exchange those,
there was some kind of exchange rate.
And it seems that in fact coinage was more valuable in
the territory in which it had been issued by the city state.
And that's why towards some time into the Peloponnesian Wars,
about 425 BCE, Athens, which had the most valuable currency, Athens
had the purest silver, was actually- ED GLAESER: Reflecting sort of superpower status
during the mid fifth century. PHOEBE SEGAL: Superpower status, right, and
the imagery on Athenian coins, the head of Athena on the obverse, so
that is the sort of the heads of the coin.
And the owl, Athena's sacred bird on the reverse, the tails, that
really strong brand imagery was famous throughout the Mediterranean and
in fact, is found really far flung in the Mediterranean.
So we find a lot of Athenian coinage in Egypt.
Egypt is very rich in grain, a commodity that Athens lacked.
We see this also in Sicily, also rich in grain.
A lot of Athenian coins found there.
So there we see the exchange of money or coinage for
commodities that were in demand. ED GLAESER: Following a sort of classic pattern
of the central city which is of the cutting edge of technology,
whether its vases or olive oil I guess.
Exporting those things to the places that can supply it with the primary products
of grain like Egypt and Sicily.
The monopoly to mint giving it authority.
What did you worry about in terms of points?
Why, if you were a trader, why did you want this particular drachmas relative
to some other currency, were worried about someone shaving off the edges.
Were worried about the lower quality of the silver.
PHOEBE SEGAL: So actually,
many of those were a factor, so Athenian silver was extremely pure.
And in fact the mines that were opened just after the Persian Wars,
the mines at Laurion, had very high quality silver.
And then it was also the trust, right, in the system.
Because of course coinage can't work if you don't
trust the political entity that's issuing it.
But we do have examples in fact in the gallery of punch marks.
ED GLAESER: A few monarchs who shaved
off their coins at their time right. PHOEBE SEGAL: Yes, no and this was a factor and
that's why sometimes we see in the coins found
in the orbit of Athens, but Egypt is an example, we see that they punched holes
through the coins to verify the purity. ED GLAESER: How did the imperial and
commercial aspects of Athens coincide?
How do we see that in the coins?
How do we see this sort of empire working out of the coins
as well as the trading side? PHOEBE SEGAL: Well,
I think to go back to the example of the imperialistic decree,
it demonstrates that Athens used its position,
its coinage to assert itself with respect to trade with
its allies and then even with its foes.
What's interesting is that Sparta, by contrast,
a city we hear much about in ancient history, Athens' rival, didn't issue
any coinage until about the third century. ED GLAESER:That's fascinating.
PHOEBE SEGAL: Isn't it?
ED GLAESER: So this awesome military superpower
managed to get by entirely without coinage, which tells you that while Athens
might have been a city of both empire and commerce, Sparta was most decidedly a city
of just empire and not commerce, right? PHOEBE SEGAL: [LAUGH] Right.
ED GLAESER: And value was presumably
stored just in land and slaves, I guess.
How does the beauty of the coins interact with the value in trade?
Were beautiful coins considered to be more useful in trade?
Or were they serving some totally different purpose?
PHOEBE SEGAL: It doesn't seem that they necessarily
added any economic value.
In the gallery,
I always think it's interesting to think about the value of the coins now, right?
Because each coin has its original value in antiquity, the value
of the metal in today's market, and then its market value on the art market.
And so we're operating, even in the gallery,
on three different sort of levels of value.
And of course the beauty is so important for us, and clearly was important for
the city states that minted the coins, because they put effort towards
the designs, which are extremely varied in the Greek period.
You have images of gods, images of local heroes, images of commodities.
Sometimes we see a kind of wine storage vessel called
an amphora. ED GLAESER: And
why would you put an amphora on a coin?
PHOEBE SEGAL: Well for instance in the coinage of Kios, which is an island just off the coast of
modern day Turkey, Kios was very famous for its wine, and so
it clearly was exporting large quantites and
we read about actually the wine trade in literature.
And so it seems that these coins also served as advertisements, both for
the ideology of this cities, we see that in Athenian coinage, but
also for the commodities as well. ED GLAESER: So,
what other objects do we have other than coins that are a legacy of commerce in
the ancient world? PHOEBE SEGAL: I'm so
thrilled that you asked that question because it addresses a theme that
we are addressing in our gallery devoted to daily life in antient Greece.
And that gallery features all kinds of themes, but
the one that will segue into the coin gallery is devoted to professions.
So, industry in Athens and elsewhere.
And also to implements used in commerce and trade.
So, we have a lot of steelyard weights.
So those were the counterbalances that would have hung off of a long chain.
The commodity would rest in the opposing scale.
ED GLAESER: And why was it so important to get the
weights in the steel yards exactly right? PHOEBE SEGAL: Well,
you didn't wanna be cheated out of anything, did you?
[LAUGH] We also have a large grain measuring block from a
Greek city called Assos in the western coast of Turkey, which has cavities in it for
different measurements of grain, and it's thought that that that
was used in the public, it was found actually in the public square in Assos.
So that would've been where you bought your grain.
ED GLAESER: It's wonderful.
So this sort of is the flip side of coin.
So part of the beauty of coins is we have a precious metal that is standardized, and
it's standardization in various denominations.
It's standardization makes people trust it.
It makes people know that you don't have to measure it each time,
you don't have to count it each time- PHOEBE SEGAL: Right.
ED GLAESER: You know what it is, and
consequently you can trade swiftly. PHOEBE SEGAL: Yes.
ED GLAESER: But there's some commodities,
which trade also requires you to know the measure of.
And those you'd need to actually measure on the spot in some sense,
right? PHOEBE SEGAL: Right.
ED GLAESER: And that's exactly what you're
showing us here.
And this is all part of the trade that cities make possible, right?
It was rising.
It's just such an insane time period to think about because it's this
first period in the west where you all of a sudden have people interacting with each
other on a large scale, from different cultures anonymously.