498 money and mints
SAINT;HERMITS AND EREMITISM; ICONOCLASM ANDICONO-
CLASTIC CONTROVERSY; MILITARY ORDERS;NORBERT OF
XANTEN,SAINT; NUNS AND NUNNERIES;ODILO OFCLUNY;
ROBERT OFARBISSEL.
Further reading:Derwas Chitty, The Desert a City
(London: Mowbrays, 1966); Giles Constable, Medieval
Monasticism: A Select Bibliography(Toronto: University of
Toronto Press, 1976); David Knowles, Christian Monasti-
cism(New York: McGraw-Hill, 1969); C. H. Lawrence,
Medieval Monasticism: Forms of Religious Life in Western
Europe in the Middle Ages(New York: Longman, 1989);
Henrietta Leyser, Hermits and the New Monasticism: A
Study of Religious Communities in Western Europe,
1000–1150(London: Macmillan, 1984).
money and mints The vast majority of the coinage
that was struck and circulated in the Middle Ages was
made from silver in the form of the penny piece or denar-
iusand its multiples or submultiples. After the barbarian
invasions, the new Frankish, Visigothic, and Ostrogothic
rulers struck gold coins in the Roman manner. They usu-
ally bore the effigy of an emperor at CONSTANTINOPLE.
After the death of CLOVISin 511, barbarian rulers began
to introduce their own monograms.
The Roman emperors reserved a monopoly on coin-
ing money in their own mints, but the barbarian rulers
could not maintain such a monopoly. Bishops, great
landed owners, and towns started to coin money. Only
the Lombard kings in Italy were able to maintain, for
their profit, a monopoly on striking coins. They punished
false coiners by cutting off their hands. Coinage in gold
was not maintained because supplies of gold bullion
dried up in the West.
CHARLEMAGNE began a return to the control of
coining. The dissolution of public authority under his
successors prevented this policy from continued imple-
mentation. Again bishops, counts, abbots, and territorial
princes by royal concession and by usurpation issued
coins, often of suspect value. Though a silver monomet-
allism was imposed in the West, mints continued to mul-
tiply, causing difficulties of exchange and reliability and
hampering the spread of international commerce. When
the economic expansion of Western Europe began in the
central Middle Ages, the need for greater quantities of
precious metals and the minting and circulation of
denominations of coins of higher value than the penny
grew. Coins and monies of account in large denomina-
tions soon entered use. Rulers and princes tried for at
least their own benefit to put pieces of good reputation
and sound quality into circulation for international trade.
During the second half of the 13th century, more
gold bullion appeared in the West by way of the sub-
Saharan trade. The Florentine florin minted first in 1253
had rapid success and numerous imitators. The resump-
tion of the striking of gold coins by several cities and
governments meant a return to bimetallism, but varia-
tions in the values of bullion content caused constant
problems in exchange and pricing. Manipulations in the
content of precious metals in coins by rulers done for
their own benefit also complicated the money market.
According to Scholastic theologians, money was the
measure of the value of goods, as expressed clearly by
Thomas AQUINAS. The popes maintained this position,
recommending that rulers resort to changes in excep-
tional circumstances. The frequency of variations in the
real values of money led Nicholas ORESMEto expound
the ideas of Gresham’s later law: bad money drove out the
good, which was hoarded, used for international pay-
ments, or even melted down by private individuals at the
mint to exchange for many more pieces of “bad” money.
All this hurt the possibilities of economic investment and
growth. The later Middle Ages saw the increased use of
fiduciary money, rather like checks, and additional efforts
to increase the supply of gold from Africa.
See alsoCOINAGE AND CURRENCY; ECONOMIC THOUGHT
AND JUSTICE; JUSTICE; TRADE AND COMMERCE.
Further reading:S. M. H. Bozorgnia, The Role of Pre-
cious Metals in European Economic Development: From
Roman Times to the Eve of the Industrial Revolution(West-
port, Conn.: Greenwood Press, 1998); N. J. Mayhew and
Peter Spufford, eds., “Later Medieval Mints: Organisa-
tion, Administration and Techniques” (The Eighth
Oxford Symposium on Coinage and Monetary History)
(Oxford: B. A. R., 1988); Peter Spufford, Handbook of
Medieval Exchange(London: Offices of the Royal Histori-
cal Society, 1986); Peter Spufford, Money and Its Use in
Medieval Europe (Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, 1988).Mongols and the Mongol Empire The Mongols
were originally nomads living in the upper Orkhon Valley
by the Amur River. They achieved unity under JENGHIZ
Khan and absorbed other peoples, one of whom, the
TATARS, gave their name a group of Mongols known by
that name in China and the West. Jenghiz Khan cam-
paigned throughout central Asia and into IRANand north-
ern China. His son, Ogodai (r. 1229–41), completed that
conquest, overran the CUMANSand RUS ́, and sent west an
army that devastated much of POLANDand HUNGARY.
Guyuk (r. 1246–48) invaded ANATOLIA and Georgia.
Mongke (r. 1249–59) began the conquest of southern
China, to be completed later by KUBLAI KHAN. Their
brother, HULEGU, destroyed the caliphate of BAGHDADand
devastated much of SYRIA. The disputed succession to
Mongke led to warfare that fractured the empire. In 1260
Mongols suffered a rare defeat at the Battle of AYNJALUT.
They continued their raids, even to JERUSALEM, but were
not able to expand into EGYPT. From 1335, Persia freed
itself from the Mongols. In 1368 China drove the Mon-
gols back onto the steppe.