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Admin moved page What is the Deep Impact of Gold? to What is the Deep Impact of Gold
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[[File:Queen Hatshepsut's expedition to Punt, plaster cast of her mortuary temple at Deir el-Bahri, Western Thebes, Egypt - Royal Ontario Museum - DSC09766.JPG|thumbnail|300px|left|Figure 1. Relief showing Queen Haptshepsut's expedition to Punt.]]
Few naturally occurring substances have had nearly universal value among ancient and modern societies as gold. We often think of gold as something decorative or worn. However, in the ancient and modern worlds, gold was also the standard in which economies and value of other objects were measured by. In effect, gold helped structure and continues to help structure economies around the world today.It was not until the 20th Century that most countries abandoned the gold standard.
===How Gold Became Important for Economies===
In early Chinese dynasties, gold probably did not play as important a role in society as jade did for luxury objects and wealth display. However, it was still used to decorate objects and often was intermixed with other precious materials. Nevertheless, as gold became a key medium of exchange or value of exchange, gold in China also gained increasing value in the 1st millennium BCE, where it was locally valued and important for trade.<ref>For more on how gold developed in China as an important substance, see: Bunker, Emma C. 1993. “Gold in the Ancient Chinese World: A Cultural Puzzle.” <i>Artibus Asiae</i> 53 (1/2): 27. doi:10.2307/3250506.</ref>
===Later Developments===
[[File:Nerva Aureus Concordia.png|thumbnail|left|300px|Figure 2. Gold coin from the 1st century CE from the Roman Empire.]]
While gold gained increased importance in places, particularly as international trade developed more formally in the 3rd and 2nd millennium BCE across the Mediterranean and Central Asia, from there the worth of gold did stall for a period. The next period of expansion likely occurred when coinage was developed. Sometime by the early 6th century BCE, silver and gold were now used to create coins. As coins were intended to symbolize value, it was important now that gold had to be pure. In fact, electrum, which combined silver and gold, was outlawed in Lydia, which has been considered the first state to use coinage. The use of coinage was initially in international trade. As empires developed across the Mediterranean in the mid to late 1st millennium BCE, that now connected the Mediterranean basin with Central Asia and India, coinage became more important for trade. The rise of the Achaemenid and particularly Greek-based empires in Bactria and Seleucia helped spread coinage to many regions. Gold now became the key material that was used for the most valued exchanges across much of the Old World. Expanding Greek colonies in Europe, increased trade across Central Asia, which became the Silk Road, and seaborne trade via India and the Arabian Sea became some of the most important trade routes in the Roman and late Classical period.<ref>For more on the role of gold coinage in international trade, see: Harris, Edward Monroe, David Martin Lewis, and Mark Woolmer, eds. 2015. <i>The Ancient Greek Economy: Markets, Households and City-States.</i> New York: Cambridge University Press.</ref>
In effect, what emerged, as key international trade routes such as the Silk Road developed, was that gold became one of the key commodities that supported the value of trade items such as silk, metals, spices, and other substances traded. The Roman's, with their important trade role, spread the use of silver and gold coins to different areas of their empire in Europe (Figure 2). After the collapse of the Roman Empire, the minting of coins had halted in many regions, particularly northern Europe. However, the Byzantine Empire continued to mint gold coins and the <i>bezant</i> became a standard used by that Empire. The Byzantine Empire dominated Mediterranean trade and southern European trade in the early Medieval period, leading to the gold standard becoming paramount in those regions. Gold continued to be used along the Silk Road and related trade routes.<ref>For more on how gold continued to shape world trade in the early Medieval period, see: Bentley, Jerry H., and Herbert F. Ziegler. 2011. <i>Traditions & Encounters: A Global Perspective on the Past.</i> 5th ed. New York: McGraw-Hill, pg. 327. </ref>
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In Europe, developing kingdoms, such as those developed by the Anglo-Saxons and Franks, began to use silver rather than gold. Silver, thus, became the main standard over gold in Europe. In the 16th century, Spain was motivated in its conquests of the New World in part by gold as it expanded its empire there and began to ship now large quantities of gold. In Europe, gold, once again, began to have greater importance in its role in the economy. It was only under the reign of Queen Anne in the early 18th century, however, and particularly after the Napoleonic Wars, that gold began to play a central role in increased international trade. The British specie began to be the standard that was used in the 18th and 19th centuries, where laws in the early 19th century helped to solidify its role. As Britain's trade empire increased, along with its trade influence, the gold standard, once again, began to spread across the globe, similar to how it did during the Classical period.<ref>For more on the spice, see: Andrei, Liviu C. 2011. <i>Money and Market in the Economy of All Times: Another World History of Money and Pre-Money Based Economies.</i> London and New York.</ref>
===Summary===
The simple, common appeal of gold led to its prehistoric presence in many societies. However, as societies developed formal governments and international trade developed, gold took on a the role of being an important medium for exchange and trade. This influence on the economy helped it to make trade items stable in their prices, but it also motivated states to control gold's access. The first example of how the control of gold gave great power occurred in ancient Egypt in the 2nd millennium BCE. This occurred also in the period of the Roman Empire, where that state played an important role in international trade through its access and control of gold. The Spanish later demonstrated how gold motivated their exploration and imperial expansion. The rise of the British Empire influenced other countries ' adoption of gold as being an important standard for currency value. Gold, more recently, has been avoided as the standard for currency value. In part, this is because of the history of gold, where its limited distribution has caused imbalances in the world economy, where countries that controlled it were able to gain unprecedented power. For the United States, moving away from the gold standard occurred as a way to avoid gold fluctuations, limitations in currency supply, and control of the economy by foreign powers. However, other countries, such as China, see that in the long-term gold may have great value, particularly if there are future major disruptions to international trade and, once again, a standard such as gold is needed to provide value to currencies or international trade. In effect, the long-term viability of global economies without using gold as a standard could be tested in the years to come.<ref>For more on how the move away from the gold standard influences economies, see: Cooper, George. 2010. <i>The Origin of Financial Crises: Central Banks, Credit Bubbles and the Efficient Market Fallacy.</i> Petersfield: Harriman House.</ref>
===References===
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