Skip to main content Accessibility help
×
Hostname: page-component-7c8c6479df-fqc5m Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-03-28T12:13:40.680Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

4 - Metallurgy and the Making of Intrinsic Value

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  03 March 2022

Sebastian Felten
Affiliation:
Universität Wien, Austria
Get access

Summary

Chapter 4 explores how artisanal knowledge helped sustain early modern monetary order by making and unmaking the intrinsic value of precious metal. Intrinsic value was a conceptual tool and a material practice that allowed people to collapse many coins into one another and to forge units from multiples. Effectively, this meant establishing a network of corresponding values between specific batches of coins. The papers of a family of assayers from The Hague offer a fine-grained picture of the processes involved. Small differences in the precious metal content of coins aroused creeping suspicion, anger, and even physical violence because it was believed that the metal of a coin reflected the mettle of a person. This was particularly true for the masters of the mint, whose reputation was tied to the reputation of their coins. Making coins, and making them work, involved financial and legal expertise, but the artisanal knowledge of assayers and other metal-workers was key. Their practices such as sampling, using high-precision balances and powerful acids, note-taking, the rule of three, and algebraic calculation allowed people to hold on to the convention that metals had an intrinsic, quantifiable value in spite of fluctuations in the price of silver and gold, both across time and across the globe.

Type
Chapter
Information
Money in the Dutch Republic
Everyday Practice and Circuits of Exchange
, pp. 95 - 135
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2022

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Save book to Kindle

To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure coreplatform@cambridge.org is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.

Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

Available formats
×

Save book to Dropbox

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

Available formats
×