Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.2 9/5/84; site alberta.UUCP Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!burl!ulysses!mhuxr!mhuxn!ihnp4!alberta!andrew From: andrew@alberta.UUCP (Andrew Folkins) Newsgroups: net.jokes.d Subject: Origin of 'dollar' Message-ID: <565@alberta.UUCP> Date: Wed, 26-Jun-85 11:06:55 EDT Article-I.D.: alberta.565 Posted: Wed Jun 26 11:06:55 1985 Date-Received: Sat, 29-Jun-85 00:56:31 EDT Distribution: net Organization: U. of Alberta, Edmonton, AB Lines: 31 Cash was the commodity in shortest supply throughout the Middle Ages, and never more so than in the late fifteenth century, when the Black Death receded. Prices rose in some places as much as 400 per cent, and although the survivors were left with twice the assets they had had before the plague, simply through inheriting what had belonged to those who died, the increase in demand for goods by the newly rich produced a drastic shortage of coin. There was, simply, not enough to go round. Then, in answer to the demand, prospectors began to find silver in the Hartz mountains, and in 1516 one of the greatest silver strikes in history was made. It was in an area of the mountains which now lies within northern Czechoslovakia, near the town on Jachymov, then known as Joachimsthal. The mountain valleys provided two vital aids to mining : water power from the falling streams to run the mining machinery, and wood to build with and to provide the charcoal needed for smelting the ores. A mining boom followed the Joachimsthal discovery, and thousands came to the valleys to seek their fortunes in the mineshafts. At peak output, between 1515 and 1540, Joachimstal was producing three million ounces of pure silver a year from it's 135 veins, and the mint in the town was coining the silver as fast as the stamping machines would go. The coin they minted was called a _joachimsthaler_, shorted to _thaler_, the word from which the modern 'dollar' comes. James Burke, _Connections_, Little, Brown and Company, 1978, pg. 70. -- Andrew Folkins ihnp4!alberta!andrew Underlying Principle of Socio-Genetics : Superiority is recessive.