Money and the Plague

Money is the one commodity that emerges from all commodities to act as a medium of exchange.  Not everyone will take fatback in change in a transaction, but everyone will take gold.  All commodities, more or less, will be used as a store of value given some circumstances, with gold the most likely commodity to be so employed.  Hence, money is not a store of value, but gold is and when gold is proffered as money, it retains its commodity faculty as well.  So, money is a medium of exchange. And gold is a store of value. When gold is money it is a medium of exchange and a store of value.

Of the many attributes that recommend a commodity as money, rarely listed for gold is gold's antibiotic properties.  Silver is used as money, and so is copper, and they both have antibiotic properties.  Before refrigeration, a silver coin might be dropped in milk to keep it fresh longer, although raw milk need never be refrigerated.  Your fear of raw dairy is a conditioned reflex, brought to you by the dairy board, who desires you fear independent dairies, or a preference for wholesome food, which is often one and the same. The longer it stays out, the more different foods it becomes.  If it happens to spoil, then throw it away.  Otherwise eat the curds, whey, sour cream, or cheese, depending where in the process you dive in.  But I digress.  Do check out the link above, and see the man who turned blue treating himself with silver.  It is permanent.  Makes one wonder if the Buddha is depicted as blue-skinned is accurate.

As new metals are discovered, the ones that are antibiotic by non-toxic also become in demand as bullion, that is money.  Rhodium, palladium, platinum are all examples.

When world trade was a matter of merchants arriving in Baghdad with silk-laden camels, the goods were exchanged, moved from camel to cart or boat, and gold and silver in payment.  These coins were antibiotic.  Nothing could live on them.  Disease could not be spread.

There was also world trade along the mediterranean, with Phoenicians trading English nickel for Levant commodities. We are told the plague showed up when an expansion of world trade brought ship-borne rates with plague carrying fleas into new markets, so Europe experienced what the American Indian experienced 300 years later.

Perhaps there was another venue as well.  The plague showed up at the same time and place paper currency began to show up.  it would be an interesting master's thesis in economics to research this.  There are plenty of records in plague areas of both currency introduction and the plague.  Coincidence or cause and effect?

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