Iron currency bars are regarded as being objects used by
Iron Age
The Iron Age is the final epoch of the three-age division of the prehistory and protohistory of humanity. It was preceded by the Stone Age (Paleolithic, Mesolithic, Neolithic) and the Bronze Age (Chalcolithic). The concept has been mostly appl ...
people to exchange goods.
Materials
They were expensive objects, as it would take 25 man-days to produce 1 kilogram of a finished bar, consuming 100 kg of charcoal, usually shaped with a small socket at one end.
Usage history
Iron spits were used as money in Greece before silver currency. Sparta deliberately used iron currency to make the amassing wealth unwieldy, and remained on an iron currency standard all through Greece's golden age.
Julius Caesar's, ''Gallic Wars'', mentions iron currency in Britain.
"For money they use bronze or gold coins, or iron bars of fixed weights." — Julius Caesar, 54 BC
Iron hoes circulated as money in India, Africa, and Indochina, and were the smallest monetary unit of the
Bahnar people
The Bahnar or Ba-Na are an ethnic group of Vietnam living primarily in the Central Highland provinces of Gia Lai and Kon Tum, as well as the coastal provinces of Bình Định and Phú Yên. They speak the Bahnar language belongs the Bahnari ...
.
During the nineteenth century, iron bars circulated as money in the Congo. During the nineteenth century, iron hoes circulated in the remote areas of Sudan. The western Uganda Chiga used hoes as their unit of account without using of them as a medium of exchange or store of value. In Portuguese East Africa a hoe standard replaced a cattle standard, and some hoes circulated only as currency and were never used agriculturally. In the French Congo, iron bars, shovels, hoes, blades, and iron double bells played the role of currency. In mid-nineteenth-century Nigeria, a slave cost 40 iron hoes.
In 1824, 394 currency bars were found, 1.2m below the surface, at a re-used camp on Meon Hill,
[
] Mickleton, Gloucestershire
Mickleton, with a population of 1,677 (UK Census 2011), an increase of 125 since the census of 1991, is the northernmost village in Gloucestershire, England.
Location
Mickleton lies close to the county border with Worcestershire and Warwickshi ...
.
[
][
]
In 1860, currency bars were discovered at
Salmonsbury Camp,
Bourton-on-the-Water
Bourton-on-the-Water is a village and civil parish in Gloucestershire, England, that lies on a wide flat vale within the Cotswolds Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty. The village had a population of 3,296 at the 2011 census. Much of the village ...
.
In 1942, Iron currency bars were found around
Llyn Cerrig Bach
Llyn Cerrig Bach is a small lake located between Rhosneigr and Valley in the west of Anglesey, Wales.
Whilst it is not one of the largest lakes on the island (around 1.8 acres), its claim to fame is the group of over 150 Iron Age metal objects ...
and the surrounding peat bog in Wales.
See also
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Iron currency bar
The Celtic currency of Britain were the various items and coins used as currency between approximately 200 BC and AD 60. The earliest currency consisted of various forms of iron bars. Coins were first imported in large numbers in around 150 BC ...
*
Iron currency bracelet
Iroungou Cave is a burial cave located near the city of Mouila in the Ngounié Province of Gabon. It is an archaeological site dating from pre-colonial Africa. It is a collective burial site with the remains of at least 28 people, and hundreds ...
References
External links
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Ancient currencies
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