A 2,500-year-old broken silver coin found near Jerusalem is rare evidence of the use of early currency in ancient Judea, according to archaeologists. This is one of several coins from this age minted in the sixth or fifth century BC, when Judea was under the control of the Achaemenid Persians, proving their very early use in the Holy Land. However, this coin was probably deliberately cut in half so that each half could be valued by its weight in silver.

“This coin is extremely rare and is added to only half a dozen coins of its type found in archaeological excavations in the country,” coin expert Robert Kuhl of the Israel Antiquities Authority (IAA) said in a statement. said. “The coins were minted at a time when the use of coins was just beginning.” Archaeologists found the ancient coin during excavations in front of a widening road about 10 miles (16 kilometers) southwest of Jerusalem.

The region was the rural region of the ancient kingdom of Judea, whose capital was Jerusalem. The settlement was probably founded in the 7th century BC during the First Temple period, before the Babylonians destroyed the temple and expelled the Jews in 586 BC, the statement said.

The remains of a “four-room house”, a traditional residence of the period, were also excavated in the area and archaeologists found a spherical house. shekel On the floor of one of his rooms were weights weighing just under half an ounce (11 grams). The IAA said in a statement that the standardized weight was evidence of early trade and could be used to weigh metals, spices and other expensive goods.

An early coin

Kuhl said in a statement that the rare finds show how trade was conducted in Judea during this period when trade changed from weighing silver coins to using coins for payment. According to him, the first such coins were “minted outside Israel, in the regions of Ancient Greece, Cyprus and Turkey.” “In the sixth and fifth centuries B.C. [до нашої ери] “Such coins began to appear in some parts of Israeli territory.”

The fact that the coin was split in half so that each half could be valued as a weight of silver (an ancient practice nowadays known by the Viking name “hacksilver” or “hacksilbur”) suggests that the use of coins was not widespread at the time. But time.

The coin was stamped with a square stamp pressed into one of its sides; Later coins used more complex techniques that resulted in protruding stamped images rather than sunken images, the statement said. IAA Director Eli Escuscido said that the visual details, inscriptions and dates on early coins are an important source of archaeological information.

“Through an object as small as a coin, it becomes possible to trace human thought processes and observe that our economic habits have remained largely unchanged over millennia,” he said in a statement. “It’s just that the technology has changed.”

According to the Austrian Institute of Archaeology, the oldest coins date back to B.C. It appears to have been minted around the seventh century B.C. in the kingdom of Lydia, in what is now Turkey, and in ancient Greek cities on the near shores of the Ionian Sea. The first coins were made of electrum, a natural alloy of gold and silver, but in later centuries pure silver became the standard.