35013Y13 Take A Dollarbill & Look At It Carefully

YOU WILL SEE THAT IT IS SIMPLY A COLOURFUL PIECE OF PAPER WITH THE SIGNATURE OF THE USA-SECRETARY OF THE TREASURY ON ONE SIDE, AND THE SLOGAN 'IN GOD WE TRUST' ON THE OTHER. We accept the dollar in payment, because we trust in God and the US secretary of the treasury. The crucial role of trust explains why our financial systems are so tightly bound up with our political, social & ideological systems, why financial crises are often triggered by political developments, and why the stock market can rise or fall depending on the way traders feel on a particular morning. Initially, when the first versions of money were created, people didn't have this sort of trust, so it was necessary to define as 'money' things that had real intrinsic value. History's first known money -
Sumerian barley money - is a good example. It appeared in Sumer around 3000 BC, at the same time and place, and under the same circumstances, in which writing appeared. Just as writing developed to answer the needs of intensifying administrative activities, so barley money developed to answer the needs of intensifying economistical activities. Barley money was simply barley - fixed amounts of barley grains used as a universal measure for evaluating & exchanging all other goods & services. The most common measurement was the sila, equivalent to roughly one litre. Standardised bowls, each capable of containing one sila, we're mass-produced so that whenever people needed to buy or sell anything, it was easy to measurethe necessary amounts of barley. Salaries, too, were set & paid in silas of barley. A male labourer earned sixty silas a month, a female labourer thirty silas. A foreman could earn between. 1,200 & 5,000 silas...
Not even the most ravenous Forman could eat 5,000 litres of barley a month, but hé cóuld úse the silas he didn't ear to buy all sorts of other commodities - oil, goats, slaves, and something else to eat besides barley! Even though barley has intrinsic value, it was not easy to convince people to úse it as MONEY rather than just another commodity. In order to understand why, just think what would happen if you took a sack full of barley to your local shopping centre, and tried to buy a shirt or a pizza? The vendors would probably call security. Still, it was somewhat easier to build trust in barley as the first type of money, because barley has an inherent biological value. Humans can eat it! On the other hand, it was difficult to store & transport barley? The real breakthrough in monetary history occurred when people gained trust in money that lacked inherent value, but was easier to store & transport. Such money appeared in ancient Mesopotamia in the middle of the third millennium BC. This was the silver shekel. The silver shekel was not a coin, but rather 8.33 grams of silver. When Hammurabi's Code declared that a superior man who killed a slave woman must pay her owner twenty silver shekels, it meant that he had to pay 166 grams of silver, not twenty coins. Most monetary terms in the Old Testament are given in terms of silver rather than coins. Joseph's brothers sold him to the Ishmaelites for twenty shekels, or rather 166 grams of silver (the same price as a slave woman - he still was a youth, after all). Ouwe Mòr maakt 't niet zoveel uit of hij gebeten wordt door 'n kat of een hond: ambtenaren, boeven, criminelen, dronkelappen, economisten, financialisten, geldwolven, huichelaars, idioten, janmaten, kloot-hommels, ladderzatte mongolen, nietsnutten, oliebollen, patatnozems, querulanten, ramkrakers, slampampers, terroristen, uitvreters, veulpoepers, wanbetalers, xenofoben, yuppen & zombies? Lood om oud ijzer! Vodden & oude metalen! Hoeveel was Yehosjoea waard voor de priesters & wat deed Yehoedah met z'n zilverlingen toen alles misliep & alles verkeerd ging onder Pontius Pilatus?
Watskeburt? Wiezeurt? Pleurt? Hurt? Purt? Meurt?
Turd? Fleurt? Treurt? Keurt? Reurt?
Kleurt? Treurt? Deurt? Geurt?
Heurt? Jeurt? Leurt?
Nurd? Veurt?
Weurt?