“Thus then, when the Lydians in the reign of Gyges came into contact and conflict with the Greeks, the two units of weight, after travelling by different routes, met again in the coast towns and river valleys of Western Asia Minor, in the borderland between the East and the West.
“To the reign of Gyges, the founder of the new Lydian empire as distinct from the Lydia of more remote antiquity, may perhaps be ascribed the earliest essays in the art of coining. The wealth of this monarch in the precious metals may be inferred from the munificence of his gifts to the Delphic shrine, consisting of golden mixing cups and silver urns, amounting to a mass of gold and silver such as the Greeks had never before seen collected together.” This treasure was called the Gygadas, and is described by Herodotus[259].
“It is in conformity with the whole spirit of a monarch such as Gyges, whose life’s work it was to extend his empire towards the West, and at the same time to hold in his hands the lines of communication with the East, that from his capital Sardes, situated on the slopes of Tmolus and on the banks of the Pactolus, both rich in gold, he should send forth along the caravan routes of the East and into the heart of Mesopotamia, and down the river valleys of the West to the sea, his native Lydian ore gathered from the washings of Pactolus and from the diggings on the sides of Tmolus and Sipylus.
“This precious merchandize (if the earliest Lydian coins are indeed his) he issued in the form of oval-shaped bullets or ingots, officially sealed or stamped on one side as a guarantee of their weight and value. For the eastern or land-trade the light mina was the standard by which this coinage was regulated, while for the western trade with the Greeks of the coast the heavy mina was made use of, which from its mode of transmission we may call the Phoenician, retaining the name Babylonian only for the weight which was derived from the banks of the Euphrates.”
To prevent misapprehension, it may be advisable to mention that the standards here termed Phoenician and Babylonian are not to be confounded with the heavy and light shekels already mentioned, but are the standards derived from the latter specially for silver, in the ways shown a little lower down.
Modern analysis of electrum from Tmolus shows that it consists of 27 per cent. of silver and 73 per cent. of gold[260]. It consequently stood to silver in a different relation from that of pure gold. Thus while gold stood to silver as 13·3:1, electrum would stand at 10:1 or thereabouts. Mr Head considers that “this natural compound of gold and silver possessed some advantages for coining over gold. In the first place it was more durable, harder, and less liable to injury and waste from wear. In the second place it was more easily obtainable, being a natural product; and in the third place, standing as it did in the proportion of about 10:1 to silver, it rendered needless the use of a different standard of weight for the two metals, enabling the authorities of the mints to make use of a single set of weights, and a decimal system easy of comprehension and simple in practice” (p. xxxiv.). The second of these reasons is probably the true one, the first being a good example of the tendency of even the most able modern writers to ascribe to early times ideas which are only the outcome of a far later period. The idea of getting a metal which will be more durable in circulation is purely modern, and not even received by Orientals in modern times. Thus the gold mohurs of India down to their latest issue were of pure gold, free from alloy (in consequence of which they are still sought after by the native Hindu goldsmiths in preference to the English sovereign, as the addition of alloy makes the latter less easy to work up into jewellery).
I allude to this here because we shall find in the course of our enquiry that most of the errors into which metrologists have fallen, are the consequence of their failing to recognize the great gulf which is fixed between the habits and ideas of a primitive community, slowly evolving principles which are now part and parcel of the common heritage of civilization, and an era like our own, when all progress is effected by the development and application of scientific principles long since discovered.
Electrum was thus coined on the same standard as silver, one talent, one mina and one stater of electrum being consequently equal to ten talents, ten minae, or ten staters of silver. The weight of the electrum stater in each district would depend therefore on the standard which happened to be in use there for silver bullion, or silver in the shape of bars or oblong bricks, the practice of the new invention of stamping or sealing metal for circulation being in the first place only applied to the more precious of the two metals, electrum representing in a small compass a weight of uncoined silver ten times as bulky and ten times as difficult of transport.