Money is not just colorful pieces of paper. It sometimes has almost magical power, influencing human beings both positively and negatively. It is impossible to imagine modern society without money, as it is an integral part of economic processes. However, there are some less obvious things that you might not know about money. We have collected the most interesting ones of them.
Any schoolchild knows that the Chinese invented the process of making paper. But, in addition, they also invented the printing of banknotes on it. Lighter in weight than classic coins, they are much more comfortable to use. They made life much easier for merchants transporting goods and money over long distances. Printing paper money began during the reign of the Chinese Song dynasty. Caring for the merchants, of course, was not a top priority. First of all, the emperor longed to save expensive metal out of the issue of coins. The the emperor used freed up resources for other important affairs of the Empire.
In 1934, the five-zero banknote was indeed issued in a limited edition in the United States. But it never reached ordinary Americans. Such a bill was used exclusively for settlements between banking institutions and to pay for large transactions with state participation.
The well-known dollar sign – $ – existed long before its appearance in the United States. You would be surprised but it appeared first on Mexican pesos. Later, these pesos circulated in the United States, while the States began to print their own money. The dollar sign came from the merger of the letters P and S.
The famous Roman emperor became the first person whose name began to adorn banknotes. Not only coins had the word “Caesar” on them, but there also was the image of an elephant – the personal symbol of the emperor. In those days, Rome won the glory of a great empire, and almost everyone considered Caesar as a living god. Many sights and things remained in his memory, one of which is such a coin.
Curiously, January 8, 1835 is the only day in the entire history of the United States when this country did not have a public debt. Moreover, this despite the fact that the national currency of this state is one of the most stable and popular in the world.
The heaviest money is a 999-carat gold coin made in Australia. It weighs exactly 1 ton. Its diameter reaches 80 cm, and its thickness is 12 cm.The face value of the huge coin is $ 1 million, although a coin cut into ingots could be sold for 55 million.
Until the 18th century, money had not had division into pennies or cents. This happened for the first time in Russia, which had decimalization in 1704: the ruble had a division into 100 kopecks.
