The Rediscovery of the Same Law

C07　—　Chain of people

It was not Gresham who wrote, "Bad money drives out good."

Supervised by: Mitsuru Hayama　／　Reading time (main text): About 8 min (3,886 characters of text at 500 chars/min; exercises and readings not included)　／　Beyond the text: 9 exercises · 2 coins · 14 readings · 1 references

What this course teaches you to do

• You can say, with grounds, whose words the so-called Gresham's law actually are.
• You can explain, from the workings of money, why the same observation kept reappearing.
• You can name the conditions required for this law to operate.
• You can give one case where it does not operate, and explain why not.
• Can distinguish between the observers before Gresham (Oresme, Copernicus) and the later person who named the law.
• Can explain the mechanism by which 'rediscovery' occurs (oblivion, translation barriers, recurrence of the phenomenon).

Lessons (8)

1. The name came last of allThe phenomenon was visible from antiquity. The name was attached in 1858. Do not reverse the order.
2. What Gresham actually had to do with itGresham did not discover the law. He was a practitioner working where bad money actually circulated.
3. Why does the same thing happen again and againThere is only one condition: that both stand at the same face value. That is why it recurs in any age or place.
4. Knowing when it fails is knowing the lawDrop the condition and the law becomes a proverb. Proverbs cannot be tested. Carry the condition with it.
5. The First Observers — Oresme and CopernicusA fourteenth-century bishop and a sixteenth-century astronomer both observed and wrote about the same phenomenon.
6. A theologian twelve years earlier — AzpilcuetaThe quantity theory of money was born in Spain. Twelve years before Bodin, and yet his name was not remembered.
7. The Man Who Rediscovered the System's Flaw — TriffinThe observation of the key currency's fate also became a named insight. A warning is at the forefront of rediscovery.
8. The Namer — Macleod and the Dynamics of a NameA name becomes a vessel to carry an observation and, simultaneously, a lid that stops the examination of its contents. Naming is a double-edged invention.

Readings (14)

• Gresham and the recoinage　Britain　1560–1858　London, and a study of a later age
  §1. The backbone of the course. It is written here who gave it the name.
• Britain　Overview: 2,700 years of the world　the 16th century　Gresham's Law
  §1. A case where the law is explained as "human nature." Read watching how strongly it asserts.
• The Great Debasement　Britain　1544–1551　An English town
  §2. The scene where debasement looks like success in the ledger.
• Gresham and the recoinage　Britain　about 1560　The queen's court
  §2. Gresham as an adviser in the queen's service.
• Gresham and the recoinage　Britain　1560–1561　The London mint
  §2. The remedy of calling in and restriking.
• Gresham and the recoinage　Britain　1571　London, the Royal Exchange
  §2. What he left behind besides advice.
• Four times the king stopped paying　Spain　1576　Antwerp
  §2. What became of the financial city where Gresham worked.
• The Coinage Act of 1792　United States　1794　The striking room of the mint
  §3. The scene where the same thing happened in the New World. The ratio is set at fifteen to one.
• The price revolution　Spain　1556　Salamanca, the lecture hall of the school
  Section 6. The theologian who was twelve years too early. The asymmetry of a name's fate.
• The anchor groans　United States　1960　Washington, the Congress
  Section 7. A modern example of something named after its observer.
• The century of silver and the price revolution　France　1566–1568　A study in the Parlement of Paris
  A counterpart to Section 6. The record from the side whose name was carried by the controversy.
• Debased Coinage　Greece　405 BCE　Theatre at the Lenaia festival
  This is the first observation, more than two thousand years before the law was named. Please verify in the original text the passage where the chorus in the comedy 'The Frogs', performed at the Lenaia festival in 405 BC, sings that good coins are hoarded while only the base copper coins with the worst impressions circulate in the market.
• The Tilting Scales　Austria　1621–1623　The Money-Changer's Table
  This text describes the physical actions people took when this law was in effect. The action of tilting a scale to sort out good coins is *wippen*, and these two verbs gave the "Kipper- und Wipperzeit" its name. Please observe the process by which the sorted silver was melted in a furnace and returned as debased coinage.
• August 1914　Russia　1914　The city
  This passage explains the same law as a matter of rationality, not human nature. It is written after correcting the common misconception that gold coins disappeared because the government recalled them, when in fact it was because people hoarded them.

Assessment

9 exercises in this course (7 check, 0 compare, 2 written). Progress is recorded by self-assessment.

References

• Monetae cudendae ratio (On the Striking of Coin). — IntraText Digital Library (original Latin text with concordance).　Copernicus's treatise on money. Full text in Latin (approx. 3,008 words). A primary source that stated the relationship between bad and good money before Gresham.

Only works and primary sources whose existence has been verified are listed.