Alexander Del Mar (1836–1926)

Ezra Pound required all of his students to read all of Del Mar's works.
DelMar claims that history is not a progression, and capitalism is not the ultimate progression of economic systems. He seemed to feel that the ancients were far more developed economically, at least the ancient Republics/Democracies, before they became empires. (But less than 1/4 were considered Citizens...)
We are not even back to the level of the ancient world in terms of our understanding of law or of economics. There is good evidence that (slavery, which was quite different in the ancient world, aside) Sparta, Carthage, the Roman Republic, and Athens while it was using lots and had the 3-obol per day citizen divident, were all more equally distributed in terms of wealth and real freedoms. Once each of these powers gained empires, both the money changed and the governments changed. What surprised me is that del Mar does not mention interest, but puts it down to the use of scarce resources for money. So, you may be right that interest rates have little to do with it, but exchange rates certainly still do, and I still think that exchange rates are based on interest/usury. (i.e. Asian Tiger crisis and speculation via exch. rates, and other examples).


Problem: a system based in law and on ideas rather than on simple currency (or as in the Middle Age, weights) requires a highly literate population, as he himself pointed out in the last page. Each of these societies used a complex law-based form of money (particularly Venice for a short while), requiring high literacy, but the implementers of the system were all highly literate, as citizenship was limited. And these were relatively small populations. Expansion and empire requires a more unequal system of commerce, as we seee time and time again in history.

Notes:
Preface: Fall of Rome -10th c. coin stock declines -> prices incr.; 10thc -19thc coin stock -> prices -->> early 14th c & late 18thc prices "virtually identical"

Ch.I Venice: paper $ system, no notes
Bank & paper $ did away w/comparative permanency of $ value; $ volume (even per population) ; Not Good...

Covers coinage/printing of $, hist of $ in china ($ older than writing), japan, Pre-al. India-muslim ind., East, abor. Europe, teh Med., Dark Ages

--Numary $ == "regulated money is an equation in time"
--Intrinsic $ system == $ = diff prices, value="substance of which it was made" p. 313/4 ; barter-based.

ch. xxvii 'from Augustas to Dark Ages' -$ of baked clay; Rome: says Pliny was *wrong*

ch xxviii Gen. term for $ =key to conception of $ {my comment: Ancients has more complex understanding of $!!}
numerary ==legal concept; ancient times til after Augustus
moneta ==commodity value; -foreign wars -modern times; {my com: reified $ came as) "a thing from the temple of Juno"
ponderata ==Dark Ages until venetians: "junk" must be weighed; no stamps/reliable authority; P. 341^ & >:cites Gaius AD 138-178 def. of ponderata as crudest form of $.

ch. 'Agrarian & social war systems' -p. 295 copper almost = silver in val. in ancient Rome because supp.of both were equally scarce

p. 303 'the Augustan system' ch xxvi -octavius restored 'copper numerary system of BC 385-269'
p 304 -to give Senate reg. power (vol. & emission of $) "would be to deliver up the gov. to them" "a purely numerary money is inconsistent with a despotic gov."
p. 305 $ interestes & bankers prev. demonetizating silver/gold, so used mixed econ. w/buillion & "highly overvalued pieces"; common w/modern: "the volume of money had no specific limit" -28 BC
P. 307 "like manner Mr. Chase..." but used Ceasar's image, not his own.
p. 314 Numismatists miss legal understanding of $;
p. 322 gold -> asia; by 4th/5th c. copper also scarce in Rome
Ch. xxvii P. 332 quotes David Hume re. fall of prices;
P. 333 {mine: money as def. by legal tender gone after Augustus}
p. 337 specie == 'in kind'
p. 340 Final chapter "Polybius attributes 'Sparta $ problem' "to the lust of foreign conquest."; Fall of both Rome & Carthage -blames "abandonment of the numerary systems."

P. 344 conclusion: unless we want prices to keep falling & have depressions, need to think on $ systems
"Unheard, unfelt, almost unseen, it has the power to distribute the burdens, gratifications, and opportunities of life...or...to violate every principle of justice, and perpetuate a succession of social slaveries to the end of time."

edited with notes:
Read, Write, Dream, Teach !

ShiraDest
19 February, 12016 HE

… (meer)

Ezra Pound required all of his students to read all of Del Mar's works.
DelMar claims that history is not a progression, and capitalism is not the ultimate progression of economic systems. He seemed to feel that the ancients were far more developed economically, at least the ancient Republics/Democracies, before they became empires. (But less than 1/4 were considered Citizens...)
We are not even back to the level of the ancient world in terms of our understanding of law or of economics. There is good evidence that (slavery, which was quite different in the ancient world, aside) Sparta, Carthage, the Roman Republic, and Athens while it was using lots and had the 3-obol per day citizen divident, were all more equally distributed in terms of wealth and real freedoms. Once each of these powers gained empires, both the money changed and the governments changed. What surprised me is that del Mar does not mention interest, but puts it down to the use of scarce resources for money. So, you may be right that interest rates have little to do with it, but exchange rates certainly still do, and I still think that exchange rates are based on interest/usury. (i.e. Asian Tiger crisis and speculation via exch. rates, and other examples).


Problem: a system based in law and on ideas rather than on simple currency (or as in the Middle Age, weights) requires a highly literate population, as he himself pointed out in the last page. Each of these societies used a complex law-based form of money (particularly Venice for a short while), requiring high literacy, but the implementers of the system were all highly literate, as citizenship was limited. And these were relatively small populations. Expansion and empire requires a more unequal system of commerce, as we seee time and time again in history.

Notes:
Preface: Fall of Rome -10th c. coin stock declines -> prices incr.; 10thc -19thc coin stock -> prices -->> early 14th c & late 18thc prices "virtually identical"

Ch.I Venice: paper $ system, no notes
Bank & paper $ did away w/comparative permanency of $ value; $ volume (even per population) ; Not Good...

Covers coinage/printing of $, hist of $ in china ($ older than writing), japan, Pre-al. India-muslim ind., East, abor. Europe, teh Med., Dark Ages

--Numary $ == "regulated money is an equation in time"
--Intrinsic $ system == $ = diff prices, value="substance of which it was made" p. 313/4 ; barter-based.

ch. xxvii 'from Augustas to Dark Ages' -$ of baked clay; Rome: says Pliny was *wrong*

ch xxviii Gen. term for $ =key to conception of $ {my comment: Ancients has more complex understanding of $!!}
numerary ==legal concept; ancient times til after Augustus
moneta ==commodity value; -foreign wars -modern times; {my com: reified $ came as) "a thing from the temple of Juno"
ponderata ==Dark Ages until venetians: "junk" must be weighed; no stamps/reliable authority; P. 341^ & >:cites Gaius AD 138-178 def. of ponderata as crudest form of $.

ch. 'Agrarian & social war systems' -p. 295 copper almost = silver in val. in ancient Rome because supp.of both were equally scarce

p. 303 'the Augustan system' ch xxvi -octavius restored 'copper numerary system of BC 385-269'
p 304 -to give Senate reg. power (vol. & emission of $) "would be to deliver up the gov. to them" "a purely numerary money is inconsistent with a despotic gov."
p. 305 $ interestes & bankers prev. demonetizating silver/gold, so used mixed econ. w/buillion & "highly overvalued pieces"; common w/modern: "the volume of money had no specific limit" -28 BC
P. 307 "like manner Mr. Chase..." but used Ceasar's image, not his own.
p. 314 Numismatists miss legal understanding of $;
p. 322 gold -> asia; by 4th/5th c. copper also scarce in Rome
Ch. xxvii P. 332 quotes David Hume re. fall of prices;
P. 333 {mine: money as def. by legal tender gone after Augustus}
p. 337 specie == 'in kind'
p. 340 Final chapter "Polybius attributes 'Sparta $ problem' "to the lust of foreign conquest."; Fall of both Rome & Carthage -blames "abandonment of the numerary systems."

P. 344 conclusion: unless we want prices to keep falling & have depressions, need to think on $ systems
"Unheard, unfelt, almost unseen, it has the power to distribute the burdens, gratifications, and opportunities of life...or...to violate every principle of justice, and perpetuate a succession of social slaveries to the end of time."

edited with notes:
Read, Write, Dream, Teach !

ShiraDest
19 February, 12016 HE

… (meer)