In September 2007, a gold-colored dollar with an image of Thomas Jefferson went into circulation. Collectors frequently buy this kind of coin, which is frequently overlooked by the general population. New coinage has, nevertheless, always played a significant role in political and historical changes extending back thousands of years. (Photo courtesy of the US Mint)

More than 1,400,000,000 $1 coins with the portraits of American presidents from George Washington to James Garfield are kept in storage in Washington, D.C. Few people even know they exist.

The coins are a part of a series that the United States Mint started in 2007. The project was abandoned in 2011 owing to a perceived lack of excitement. The bulk of the collector coins with images of other presidents have not been released into circulation.

Americans are attached to their paper money and want to use it, even if it costs the government more money.

The social and political upheaval caused by the introduction of the first coins more than 2,500 years ago, according to Tom Figueira, a professor of classics at Rutgers University in New Jersey, is incomparable to the current scenario.

According to Figueira, the invention of coinage resulted in significant mental changes. It was a brand-new way to evaluate value.

The first coins

The first coins were jingling in the wallets of Lydians, a kingdom associated with ancient Greece and situated in what is now Turkey, around 600 B.C. They had a stylized lion's head and were made of electrum, a gold-silver alloy.

Money as an idea has existed for a while. Shells were used as money in ancient China, while Mesopotamians developed a banking system 5,000 years ago where individuals could "deposit" crops, animals, and other goods for storage or trade.

According to Figueira, it wasn't until coins were invented that the social effects of having money really started to take hold. He believed that maintaining order in a society that had grown more complicated was the driving force for the minting of the first coins.

Coins allowed city-states to organize their processes in a beautiful and just way, according to Figueira, who spoke to LiveScience. "They created the idea that subjects like military subsidies are open and handled in a systematic way.

Note- You can visit Buying of old coins for buying or selling of old currencies.

Greek labs1

Shiny new coins started to appear all throughout the Mediterranean a few decades later, as the Lydian experiment seemed to be working.

It's fairly evident that it worked, and Greek city-states served as a testing ground for many social experiments like this, according to Figueira.

Athens, Aegina, Corinth, and Persia all had their own currency designs by the sixth century B.C., which aided in the development of trade networks. As a favored material, gold and silver took the place of electrum, with coin values reflecting the real worth of the metal rather than a fixed quantity, as is the case with modern currencies. Celtic and later Roman coinage used the same practices.

Coins arrived everywhere, allowing those with little social mobility to ascend. According to Figueira, people may travel with more than just the clothes on their backs.

The enormous diversity of coinage in Europe caused the majority of the early hitches, according to Figueira, which needed to be worked out. Most towns have symbols that express their sense of pride in their communities.

He said, "The pictures were a way of showing social cohesiveness, of telling people who we are and who our heroes are." While the Celts embellished their coinage with runes, animals, and important rulers, the Romans honored their emperors.

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